Where'd They Go?

I saw them here last week but now I can't find them anywhere. Where'd they go? Surely they didn't just get up and walk away. Oh wait a minute. Where did those tacky display boxes come from? What is behind them? I bet those nasty 'ole cigarettes are back there.

If you happened to stop into a corporate run convenience store in Ontario this past weekend, you might know what I am talking about. As of Saturday, the famous, or infamous, wall of cigarettes has been forced under cover as Ontario's new rules on tobacco came into effect preventing the open display of tobacco products. For those smaller stores that cannot afford the ugly and expensive display cases, they are forced to use alternate methods to erase the image of DuMaurier, Peter Jackson and Benson & Hedges, to name a few, from our minds. Some have had to resort to using cardboard to hide the legalized cancer sticks. Very inconspicuous!

Normally I wouldn't care about this type of silly legislation (if that is what it is) as I never really paid attention to the cigarette wall in the first place. I knew it was there and know in most cases it still is there. The curiosity these secret compartments will raise in children will only be intensified when the answers their parents give to their questions are not satisfactory enough to diminish the curiosity. And isn't curiosity one leading factor in children smoking? That's what lead me to lighting my first cigarette and choking back a few drags before figuring them out.

Okay so the above situation may not happen anymore than it already does; it may not happen any less though either but that is not why I'm writing. I recently went to a Macs convenience store to by a froster (and it was quite tasty too), at the time unaware of the implementation date of this display ban. (I had heard something about the ban previously but shook my head and forgot about it). After filling up my cup with the slushy goodness I proceeded to wander towards the front cash wondering if there was something else I needed. Chips, no; gummies, no; chocolate, maybe; mike and ikes, sure why not; beer, nope.

Wait a minute, did I see that right? Beer in a convenience store? When did that happen? I had to check that out again. Lucky for me it was right by the front of the store, in the middle of a candy aisle, in full view of the entrance. Had I not made a b-line straight to the froster machines at the back of the store (i.e. if I was a kid and was trying to decide on the best item(s) to rot my teeth with...and maybe even my gut) I would have seen the display of beer right away. The beer turned out to be dealcoholized beer but at a quick glance it looked like real beer.

At least the cigarettes were hidden.