The sun, as reserved for smoking diners.

Today we spent the afternoon with my mom as part of the closing ceremonies for Kat's 30th birthday weekend.

We attempted to go to Piggly Wiggly's but they were closed, so we moved up the hill to the crest, and popped in at Woodrose.

I love the Woodrose experience. Chill outside in the sun, enjoy the atmosphere, and indulge in a lovely woodrose salad, or maybe a beef curry & rice, or if you're as daring as I am today, both!

The only problem I experienced with our plan, was that the outside area is also the dedicated smoking area. What does this mean for my culinary decadance?

Well, essentially, legislation is in place to protect patrons such as Kat, my mom, and I from being exposed to the cancer-causing effects of the nasty nasal-intruding stench of cigarette smoke. In principle this is great, but practice is a whole different beast: What this means for restauranteers is that by-and-large it's cheaper for them to simply allocate their already established outside area for smokers, and keep the non-smokers inside. It's a cheap and quick *legal* solution, but it does mean the non-smokers (by inference of the non-smoking habit, generally the more considerate of the two categories, but that's a moot point and not worth entering into now) are restricted to dining inside a stuffy establishment, while the *smokers* get to lounge outside in the lovely warm sunshine, and enjoying the "fresh air". Ironic, isn't it? The non-smokers are essentially the more likely to want fresh air, and yet the only fresh air available is now allocated for the smokers, who don't GET fresh air!

Let's think about this, smoking inside a smoking section gives you plenty of "free hits". Smoking outside just spoils the only pleasant air around the restaurant. Why should the smokers be granted the "exclusive use" of the fresh and open air? A smoker may argue that making it a non-smoking area denies them of some proprietary right, but that's not true. Surely it should be a smoke-free area, and if smokers want to enjoy it, they swallow their cravings, and go and sacrifice for a few minutes, rather than the reverse for non-smokers? It makes little sense to me that the non-smoker should be exposed to an element that is out of their control (tobacco smoke) if they want to enjoy the outside dining experience, whereas if the reverse happened, the smoker would be exposed to less harmful elements by having to go cold-turkey for about an hour if they chose to go outside? Essentially, smokers should make the choice - smoke inside, or dine outside smoke-free! The reversal of circumstances would leave little choice for a non-smoker!

That being said, it remains a smoker's heaven at the moment and non-smokers are the ones having to either forego the beautiful outside dining experience for the benefit of clean air, or risk a coughing fit and smelly meal in the comfort of "fresh air" outside.

Regardless, our meal was still great and I still vote the woodrose salad the best meal I've tried on the menu!! Highly recommended!!