I found one store which had acres of air-conditioned well-lit display space with only a few customers. I asked the cashier, (could not find an assistant), where I would find slacks other than black but her brief answer was that only black available.

I had always bought nice nightdresses and dressing gowns at this store, but now I found only some grey skinny pyjamas. I looked for bed sheets, maybe a pastel pink, but bright strawberry is apparently the “in colour”. Take it or leave it.

MORE LETTERS:

In the apparel shop the assistant told me how tired she was and sat down allowing me to serve myself.

There was a price sticker on the item and a big sign which said, “20 per cent off” so I calculated that 20 per cent off the price on the sticker was what I would pay.

The assistant informed me that the 20 per cent had been taken into account before the sticker was put on the item. I argued that this seemed to be misleading and the assistant referred me to the address of the company, which was printed on the receipt.

Some smaller businesses seem to offer good friendly service and a sandwich shop provided a lovely meal and nothing was too much trouble. Perhaps the malls and chain stores have reached their optimum financial efficiency with consumers having little choice but to accept the modern approach to retailing?

Referring to a national news media column on January 31, a contributor from Queensland, put forward a proposal to catch water from one of the tributaries of the Darling River in central Queensland, with the added benefit of pumped hydro.

"What do you think about that?" Sounds similar to what I suggested in my previous letter. Has any thought been given to another Snowy Scheme on the upper reaches of the Darling River? (Sorry! Too hard I hear you say, just a thought).

But then, I did catch our latest prime minister spruiking his government would create 1.25 million new jobs over five years - if elected. Sounds like the prime minister has something in mind, waiting for official clarification on where a proportion of these jobs will eventuate, could be in central Queensland, maybe!

MORE LETTERS:

Regarding the mess our politicians/bureaucrats have landed the desperate irrigators/townspeople along the Darling River in, now might be an opportune time for the "so-called experts", to wade upstream through the dead fish to get a "good feel" for the dying river and taking this national issue seriously showing leadership for the people along the river and the nation, with bottled water in hand.

The report into the Murray-Darling Basin Plan just handed down, spells out how "stuffed up" the plan is.

I suggest irrigators extracting illegal water from the Darling River, with no regard for others downstream, might need more than bottled water if reading the commission's report should have their water licences revoked as penalty for their disregard to others suffering along the river.