Bee-dubya-ell, when there's a TV in a restaurant, you can always sit with your back to it. Other people might be tired or lonely and just wish to vegetate, you know.

Anyway, I've noticed recently how often people won't even look at a public television. I was waiting for a plane in Dallas a couple years ago, and American Airlines had installed TV's everywhere. In my gate area, not one person was looking at them. All they did was add to the noise and stress. (It was a miserable night of storms and cancelled flights.) It would have been better to have saved the money and passed the savings on to passengers.

A month ago I went to a coffee house near home. There was a TV going in the first room, and no one was in it. Yet twelve or so were in the next room, talking to one another. Tada!