One of the few remaining opportunities we have to show good-natured tolerance and friendliness towards a stranger is when you both walk towards each other and there is that fleeting moment of eye contact, grinning and both stepping aside in the same direction, followed by a smiling and jocular “sorry”. Cameron Roh and other “pavement vigilantes” (Letters, 9 November) seem intent on creating a dystopian Orwellian urban environment, with the population marching in single file towards a future of grim conformism.
Bob Caldwell
Badby, Northamptonshire
Have I broken a record in smug letter writing (Letters, 12 November)? My first letter to the Guardian was written with my friend Maureen Statham about 1950 when we were at school. It proposed the need for a bin to stop people throwing used bus tickets on the bus platform.
Margaret Martlew
Sheffield
Reading recent correspondence about what’s considered “cool” nowadays brings to mind a remark Alexei Sayle once made. He bought a tin of sardines and noticed that the label said “Keep in a cool place”. So he took it to Ronnie Scott’s.
Maggie D’Araujo
Lytham St Annes, Lancashire
Even spelling out a name doesn’t always work in coffee shops (‘You get more attention than you would choose’: how an unusual name can shape your life – for better or worse, 13 November). My son, Marc, when asked for his name, said “Marc with a C.” The cup read “Cark”.
Tim Davies
Batheaston, Somerset
