bread loaf bandit

Early start as our friend had to catch a boat in Oban. We walked from their estate into Penicuik to catch a bus into town. On the way we passed many new housing developments. People living there totally depend on cars to get to anywhere. In town we visited my other place of work. None of my old colleagues was around but one of the new guys. He was really nice. We could leave our bags in the office and wander town unencumbered. Visited the bank to close some accounts that where no longer needed and changed the type of another. I noticed the branch we were in is going to close in the autumn. Times have changed. I first opened the account when I got to Edinburgh in 1995 in a tiny branch at KB. Eventually this branch closed and we had to go to a branch further in town. This also closed. While we were in the bank I noticed that some people clearly having a difficult time doing their banking. The staff clearly new them and their issues and asked about their family. There is an amount of social work going on as well. This will fall away and people who cannot use the internet for whatever reason will struggle to do their banking. The digitisation is sucking the life out of communities. I guess profits might increase. We do add complexity and centralise functionality (see cloudstrike disaster) and lose social interactions. The question is then, what it is all for? We need to put people back into the centre. The bank people were refreshingly unbureaucratic and we got most of the things done except for some phone calls that I need to make because they can't be done in the bank. Walk down Leith Walk to see if I can find some tea vs bread tags and check out the big wheels (see extra) that were found during the tram works. Leith Walk is still great but it also ended up with some additional cafes that replaced shops. Being able to go to actual shops to buy whatever we need is something that I really appreciate in Berlin. 

We did totally avoid the festival apart from yesterday's drinks in the Pleasance. Town is incredibly busy. The amount of traffic is just insane. Add to that all the visitors and moving through town is a rather unpleasant experience. I am not sure if it was always this bad or that we just forgot. There is simply not enough space for all the cars and buses and people. We are totally spoiled in our part of Berlin with quiet roads and big trees. 

In the afternoon we picked up our bags and took a 30 bus to Musselburgh to see some friends. We very much enjoyed a quiet evening of catching up.