Richie's Police Report

Leaving on a jet plane This has been a bit of a busy week for me, spent, in the main closing down my apartment, saying goodbye to friends and preparing to board the bus back home to Edinburgh.  All of which has been a good bit harder than I expected! First off, I’ve managed to accumulate a lot of stuff, such as bedding, pots and pans and the like.  Craigslist is a fantastic place to stick these for sale, but many of the responses were not what I had expected.  I priced everything to sell -  there was no room in my hand luggage for the two single beds my kids slept on - so my prices were low.  To that end, responses were high and not always from people wanting to buy.  I got, I think about 60 calls, emails and texts for each item from people who wanted what I had for free.  I got calls from homeless shelters, families in poverty and homes for battered women all looking for my stuff.  I don’t know if that happens when things like this go on Gumtree in the UK -  I’ve cert

To rely on the kindness of strangers As I was leaving the Metro tonight I passed somebody who started to say ‘hello’.  Nothing strange there, the mobile signal in Metro stations is pretty good and people talking on hands free is a regular occurrence.  Then I heard the ‘hello’ repeat as I walked by along with a ‘can you help me’?   I turned to see a blind lady with a stick.  I asked if I could help and she introduced herself at Kathy.  She told me she needed to leave the station by a particular route in order to catch a specific bus and asked if I would help her do that.  I offered her my arm and off we went.  Our journey together lasted around 7 minutes and included stairs, ice, road crossings, more ice, a grilled footpath and even more ice.  A bus came, it was the number 42 Kathy had wanted and I put her on it.  During our few minutes together she had shaken my hand, told me she felt safe with me because I was tall, let me know she thought Scots were great, asked me about