ASK PETE – FEBRUARY 2015

Forgot what colour your car is? Wi-Fi dropping out in the bedroom? Your organic blueberries going mouldy before you can eat them? DV recorder full? Pete is the man with the answers!

Pete, I can’t get my whippet ‘Fifi’ to come back to me down at the park, it’s embarrassing, what can I do?

Barry, Yarraville

Pete says: “What you should do is… for starters change the poor dog’s name. No wonder he (?) won’t come back, if I had been dubbed Fifi and heard you screaming my name out at the top of your lungs in a public place, I’d use all my whippet super powers to run as fast and far as I could. Maybe something like, ‘Butch’ or ‘Brutus’ or even ‘Pete’ would be more appropriate. And if he still won’t come back, take your $2000 bamboo fishing rod out of its packaging, attach him to 300ft of nylon and just reel him in like a 20 pound snapper when he makes a run for it.”

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Hi Pete, last year I bought an exercise bike on ebay – one of those fancy ones that measures incline, analyses your average speed, displays your heart rate, and comes with built in infoTV. Wouldn’t you know it, one day past the warranty, the on-board computer blew a chip and the whole thing has locked up!

Bill, Seddon

Pete says: “What you should do is… Trade it in for one of those ‘real’ bikes with two wheels that you can actually ride outside in the sun and fresh air! I know it sounds crazy considering you have air conditioning and your finger continuously on the pulse of quality programing about the George Foreman grill and Magic Bullet mixer, but the truth is the hardest part will be managing to avoid being roped into eight hour rides by some suburban ‘dad’ cycling group that hates golf but still want something to do on the weekends when they’re away from work.”

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Dear Pete, I recently bought a top of the range dishwasher, and while it’s great to have, I find myself constantly stacking and un-stacking the damn thing. Surely there’s an easier way?

Brian, West Footscray

Pete says: “What you should do is… Buy two more dishwashers! A man with three dishwashers never has to unstack anything – just use your shiny, whirring mechanical wonders as storage! OK so you may have to re-arrange your kitchen a bit so as to get rid of those pesky shelves and cupboards to make room for them, but at the end of the day it will feel like a small price to pay.”