Shropshire Star

Peter Rhodes on migrants in Ireland, snoozing in the Lords and a cafe dealing with Noahs

I suggested recently that nothing is more irritating in a cafe than noisy old blokes putting the world to rights with much effing and blinding.

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Photo: Joe Giddens/PA Wire

But, of course, there is something more irritating. It is the influx of Noahs (No Office At Home). This breed arrives in the cafe at about one minute past 9am, orders a small Americano, plugs its laptop into to the cafe's plug socket and does what passes for work. It must be infuriating for restaurateurs to see their broadband and electricity treated as a free extra. But it gets worse.

A cafe in Canterbury reached the final straw when people on computers asked the staff to “keep the noise down” to allow Zoom meetings. The owners responded by banning laptops. Another tiny step on the road back to civility.