This evening I caught up with a friend of mine, Graeme. We went to the Balmoral, an upmarket, expensive hotel which sits above Waverley Station, in Edinburgh, for a couple of pints of Guiness each. When we got there Graeme disappeared for a bio break. When he returned he said he'd solved one of the worlds biggest problems: how to encourage folk to drink less alcohol.
His suggestion is to not tax alcohol, nor to put a minimum price on alcohol (which is what the Scottish Government are currently doing) but, instead, to put the bathrooms in every pub 3 flights of stairs down (and back up again) from the bar. Thats the layout in the Balmoral.
He was joking, at first. But then when we thought about it, we figured he might be on to something. Laziness, or the avoidance of effort, is a far bigger cost to many people (myself included) than the monetary cost of having less loose change in your trouser pocket the following day.
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Amazon Vine just gave me a remote control which costs £150. It kinda follows the exact opposite principle. Some people will spend a lot of money to avoid standing up.
