Exasperation at the Easy Internet Café

A visit to an Easy Internet Café with a £2 coin can prove a challenge.

The ticket machines in this particular café don't carry any helpful instructions telling you which coins they accept. Several attempts with a £2 coin proved fruitless, so after having climbed the two flights of stairs to the floor with the access points, I trudged back down to the Nero coffee shop on the ground floor and asked Mr coffee shop owner - the one with the oiled haircut - if he could exchange my £2 coin for two £1 coins. He sighed and somewhat mockingly told me there was a change machine upstairs at the very end of the room. "Oh", I said and went looking. After climbing the stairs and walking the length of the building I found a slim, grey change machine, read the notice on the front that said it didn't accept £2 coins and said, "Hrumph!". Again, I trudged down to report my frustration to Mr Coffee with the oiled haircut who responded with a pleasant stream of guttural Scottish:

"It's no ma business pal, see we only rent the space, we dinna know how it works. So it's no ma problem.
Here, I'll gie ye two pound coins but am dae'ing ye a real favour cos am no supposed tae open the till, see!

So I climbed back up the stairs and finally, pressed the green button then inserted my pound coins into the ticket machine ... and out they popped again in the reject slot! After the third time I began giggling - I mean what the f£$&!" are you supposed to do?

Then I thought, "Ah, let's visit that change machine again." It claimed to issue 50 pence pieces in exchange for £1 coins, and indeed it did just that. Back to the ticket machine now with four 50p coins. Eureka! A ticket for one hour on the net.

What a palaver!!

Unfortunately now, I can't remember what on earth I was going to post. "Hrumph!" It's just as well that EasyJet airline flights don't have to be paid using a coin machine.

Listening to: conversations in an Internet Café
Wondering: what look to give Mr Coffee on the way out.