Some years ago I was standing outside a pub when an old blind man walked out the door and stood beside me. I watched with mild interest as took a lighter from his pocket and lit a cigarette stub in his mouth. I was a painfully shy person at the time but for some reason I thought I’d speak to the man.

I commented on the bad weather and he agreed that it was pretty awful. I asked him if the rain made it harder to walk with his stick and he said no, he liked walking in the rain because there were less people in his way.

Well we spoke for a while about many things including how a lot of the time when people helped him cross the road, he wouldn’t actually need to cross but he would, just to keep them from being embarrassed. He was a pretty funny guy.