privacy wars

“...London wasn’t the first city I’d lived in, but it was certainly the largest. Anywhere else there is always the chance of seeing someone you know, or at the very least, a smiling face. Not here. Commuters crowd the trains, eager to outdo their fellow travellers in an escalating privacy war of paperbacks, headphones and newspapers….”
- Belle De Jour: Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl

My weapon of choice has got to be the paperback. Better still paperback and headphones emitting inaudible music... and sunglasses (especially when it’s dark). Alternatively, may as well cover my head with a paper bag (might attract peculiar looks but, fortunately perhaps, I wouldn't notice)
So what’s yours?

Just occurred to me that if one wishes to spread propaganda, could do much worse than a tube ad... whenever I happen to make eye contact (which appears to be a heinous crime) with a fellow passenger in a carriage, our eyes involuntarily and immediately avert their gaze aloft to re-read that (most interesting) advertisement regarding travel insurance; yes, the one I’d just read six times in the preceding four minutes...