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What else could we tumble down Dunedin's Baldwin St now Cadbury has rolled out of town? These pink Jaffas featured in the 2015 race. PHOTO: LINDA ROBERTSON

But I was overtaken frequently by the Yaktrax brigade. I also got the sense they were looking down on me, wearing my scruffy, torn, stained old socks from Farmers. However, I made it to the Octagon without a slip or slide on the icy paths, which is the main thing.

Lots to cover today after a busy week and ahead of a long weekend (for some that is).

Baldwin St rolling

A reader who doesn't want his name used had this idea. (Incidentally, I explained that, without a name, you might think I've just made this up. But he wouldn't budge and, as it's a good suggestion, I'm quite happy if you reckon I came up with it.)

``Could I suggest as a possible replacement to the Jaffas on Baldwin St that we use ping-pong balls? They have numerous advantages over those Jaffas.

``The balls are very light and certainly don't constitute a health and safety hazard like Jaffas. I don't believe they will break up on the way down the street, which would save a lot of time and money on associated cleanup costs and they, the survivors, could be reused for possibly years to come.

``To use any type of fruit would be like watching someone make a truckful of fruit salad in minutes. Not to mention the mess.''

That seems a very good proposal. Any other ideas out there?

What a gorgeous image! Linda Doubleday (9), now of Waikouaiti, and brother Adrian (7) photographed by their dad sitting in the lounge of their Auckland home in 1960 as they watched the first regular television programmes broadcast in New Zealand. PHOTO: IRVINE PAGETT

There's some great recollections coming in of the early days of television, here and overseas. Don't stop now you're on a roll.

Lance Fox of the Otago Peninsula says his earliest memories go back to the early 1950s.

``We were living in the north of England at the time and had an open invitation to visit the elderly lady across the road to view her TV and/or use her phone, neither of which we had.

``Her television was black and white, and colourised with a screen in front - blue at the top, pink in the middle, green at the bottom. Landscapes were weird enough, to say nothing of the closeups!

``The earliest programmes which my younger brother and I watched were the Westerns. Hopalong Cassidy (William Boyd, 1952-54) was one.

``In 1953, when we moved south, we became the proud owners of both a television and a phone. That year there was The Quatermass Experiment, a British science-fiction serial (six half-hour episodes), broadcast by BBC Television during the summer and the first of four series. Incidentally, it was broadcast live as was Coronation Street, unlike the filmed US shows.

``Later memories include The Army Game (1957-61), which featured just about every British comedy star at one time or another. And on Sunday evenings from 1955 on there was Val Parnell's Sunday Night at the London Palladium, with Bruce Forsyth (``I'm in charge'') taking over as compere in 1958. From 1953, our parents were glued to the Liberace show, with his guests, on Sunday afternoons.

There were a lot of Westerns too. Have Gun - Will Travel, Gunsmoke, The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp, Rawhide and not forgetting Bonanza that ran from 1959 on.

``Of course, 1953 was the year of the coronation and the first live broadcast of any such occasion, except to see a colour version we had to go to the cinema.''

Thanks Lance. I remember an episode of Coronation Street in the early 1980s in which Eddie Yeats promised Hilda Ogden a colour telly, and turned up with one of those attachable colourised screens. Stan loved it - perfect for watching horse racing he said - but needless to say, Hilda wasn't having a bar of it.

Like noodles... ``We came home from a holiday last week in China,'' sender David Chronican says, ``and this morning saw in the ODT the power poles undergoing maintenance on the corner of Bay View Rd. Despite being older poles, they are kept beautifully compared to some we saw in China. PHOTO: DAVID CHRONICAN

She says her memories go back to being a little girl in England in the 1950s, watching Andy Pandy, Bill and Ben the Flowerpot Men, Rag Tag and Bobtail and Sooty.

``I can remember my brother and I hiding behind the settee when Davy Crockett and the Last of the Mohicans was on.

``We arrived in New Zealand in 1959 and, to our horror, there was no TV! Mum and Dad bought a new TV when it became available here a couple of years later. My first crush was on Dr Kildare and then Jess Harper in Laramie.''

And unfortunately that is all we have room for this week. Have a safe and relaxing long weekend, and don't just sit there watching the telly. I'll see you back here on Monday morning.