I hated the smokiness of pubs and other public spaces, and my life is quite transformed now that I don't have to suffer it. I used to go to sessions in pubs and come home reeking of smoke. Sometimes the smell of my own hair would wake me in the night afterwards. I play the melodeon, and after a pub session, the next time I took the box out to play at home, I would take it outdoors and give the bellows a few big in-and-outs, to rinse out all the smoky air that I'd brought home with me. Ugh. I do notice the smell now from smokers who've come into a pub or a shop or a bus having just had a ciggy, but it's a small annoyance compared with having to live with the stink for hours on end as we once did. It's almost seven years now since this transformation in the UK, and I have to say a big thank-you to our "Nanny State", who achieved what successive voluntary campaigns had failed to accomplish. Marje
|