Edinburgh at festival time is full of faces that you just can't place...
One of the many, many weird things about Edinburgh is that if you come here for a few years, you soon know virtually everybody you see in the street. You raise your eyebrows in recognition so often that the whole city looks permanently startled.
You might not know their name, or what they do, but everyone's familiar. Did you meet them at a party? Or were they in something you saw on stage? Maybe you just nodded recognition to them once in 1997 without quite knowing who they were, and have been stuck in the same bizarre ritual ever since, neither one of you daring to admit your ignorance and ask who the other is.
I met my Edinburgh neighbour for the first time yesterday and, surprise, it was someone I recognised: the Comedy Store Player Richard Vranch. Or, to give him his full surname, Richard Vranch-On-The-Piano, as fans of Whose Line Is It Anyway? will know him.
We had a brief chat on our shared landing and went our separate ways. Which means after 10 days, I've now spent more time talking to my neighbour here as I have to my neighbour in London who moved in 18 months ago. And they say the English capital's unfriendly.
