Makes Me Laugh

OK so London is finally starting to figure out that turning into a Global Financial Center means that people like you and me--er, people like me--simply won't walk into a coffee shop (say, the coffee shop pictured here in its entirety) or a restaurant that doesn't at least acknowledge a general distaste towards swallowing cigarette smoke along with the day's freshly-baked almond croissant and espresso. And in fact in today's Budget Speech, Chancellor Gordon Brown raised the tobacco duty 900% the amount that he raised the duty on a pint (hear, hear!). So it is all the more the-inner-chuckle-chuckle for me to see every day on my morning walk (see post March 20) this proud display of this public "Smoking Area" notice for the non-converted in a coffee shop the size of which you can see in the photograph above--all of 10 x 10! And we are talking Imperial measures here. My apologies for the flash-reflection: I was in a hurry lest the smokers come chasing after me on the street... I confess, I actually walked into this shop very briefly indeed one morning thinking "awesome! they recognize non-smokers" ... cough cough cough