Smoke gets in your eyes.

When the smoking ban in Spain was reinforced so that bars and restaurants could no longer have a smoking room inside the establishment, many places simply enclosed their terrazas and made these the smoking areas instead. This solution is fine so long as customers don’t object to walking through a fog to get into the smoke-free interior. AND so long as the adjoining door is kept closed!!! 

As you might have guessed, in the last few days I have been to a number of establishments where the door separating the addicts from those of us seeking a slightly healthier lifestyle has been left open. Sometimes it’s carelessness. Sometimes it’s so that a smoker can get his/her fix but also continue a conversation with a friend who prefers to stay inside, usually a conversation shared with everyone else in the place as it goes on at top volume. In one place, it’s the owner who goes and stands just barely outside the door so that she can have a cigarette while keeping an eye on her domain. Now, I don’t mind getting up and closing the odd door but I’m not tackling that particular dragon. She might stop giving me free food with my beer. But the gradual drift of smoke into the allegedly smoke-free zone is rather annoying. 

Of course, it’s not just here in Spain. In the UK it’s become a regular thing to have to run the gauntlet of a band of hardy smokers just outside the door to a pub. A case of hold your breath and run! 

Sitting in one of these partially contaminated venues yesterday, I was reading the British papers online. Despite the G8 summit going on, this is a bit of a “slow news” time. Consequently we’ve been treated to stories about David Cameron going “wild swimming”. Perhaps trying to emulate President Putin’s early morning swims in preparation for his day’s politicking, DC has been swimming in an Irish lough/lake early in the morning before the conference. Maybe he’s trying to impress us with his derring-do. This may be so but I’m not sure that Prime Ministers are supposed to set us such examples. Aren’t lakes quite dangerous places to swim in? Does swimming in the sea count as “wild” swimming as well? No idea. I’ve not even made it into the pool yet this summer. 

Another story I spotted was the sad tale of Nigella Lawson, celebrity cook, exponent of the art of sexy cooking and generally regarded as a happy rich person, in a restaurant where her rich husband was seen trying to throttle her. He maintains that this was just play-fighting. Really? I’ve never been much of a believer in that kind of play; I tend to think it leads on to the real thing. Nigella has been quiet about it and the rich husband has “accepted” the police caution he was given, in order to avoid complicated explanations if the case had to go to court or so he says. Again I say, really? There have been some outraged comments along the lines of “how can this happen to the Nigella Lawsons of this world?” just as if domestic violence was the preserve of the less financially fortunate. I don’t think it’s any respecter of status! 

Anyway, having read a few things I decided to change papers and took a look at the Telegraph, clicked on an article and had a little message pop up. Apparently we have looked at the allocated number of free articles available to us this month on the Telegraph. If we want to read more than headlines online we need to subscribe. 

Well, goodness me! Right wing stinginess! 

Back to the Guardian for me!