A few days after this episode with Paul and the angry man, I was watching Piers Morgan debating the gun control issue with one Alex Jones, a passionate defender of Americans' right to own guns, and also the instigator of a petition to deport Piers Morgan for his very public anti-gun stance.
Now Piers Morgan does have an annoying face and this, combined with hearing an opposing view on an emotive issue like guns, could lead even the most saintly to raise their voice. But this does not do justice to the reaction from Alex Jones. In fact, to say he went berserk, ballistic or stark raving mad, would not even cover it.
He raged that it would be 1776 all over again and that the republic would rise up in protest if their guns were to be taken from them. He ranted, screamed, on and on. And I started to feel as I did when the man in the coffee shop was berating Paul the poodle - sheer embarrassment that somebody could display such emotion in public.
Irrespective of what either of them was actually saying, I marvel at a society that can accept their displays of emotion and anger, and move on. Alex Jones has attracted some ridicule for what he said, but people don't seem to mind him totally losing it one day, and then expecting still to be listened to the next.
The English tendency to suppress anger has led to a more cordial society, but one where grievances tend to be nursed in private, where they can grow out of proportion and feed all sorts of passive aggressive acts in public. Ugly as it is to watch, maybe we can learn something from this American willingness to scream and shout, to let all the emotions go, and not to mind who is watching.
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