Argos catalogue | Eat out to help out | Getting the Guardian | Velveteen breeches | French wine
In 1986 a friend asked her class of six-year-olds to write letters to Father Christmas. Most of the class asked for a My Little Pony or a Transformer, but one boy just wrote a column of seven-digit numbers. It seems he had memorised the Argos catalogue numbers for the items he wanted and thought it would save Father Christmas some time (The Argos catalogue: why Britain’s love affair with The Book of Dreams had to end, 6 August).
Dee Reid
Twyford, Berkshire
• The idiotic “eat out to help out” scheme (Editorial, 5 August) has a further shortcoming. Restaurants that automatically add service to the bill calculate this after subtracting the government discount. Some of the worst-paid workers are being robbed of up to half of their tips.
Richard Platt
Hastings, East Sussex
