The last day into Krakow was terrible with a strong crosswind and lashing rain. It was a real battle to make it to the city on time, but it was worth it because I had a 'warmshowers' host by the name of Patryk to get to. So I battled my way through and into the outskirts of the city, where I saw a very highly visible man standing near a gas station. He was also standing with a touring bike of some sort, which had a very highly-visible trailer attached to it, and he waved me over to him.

The man spoke no English, but another young guy nearby acted as a translator. The latter explained that this highly visible man was known as 'The Reflective Angel' and cycled around Poland giving away free reflective equipment to cyclists. That was enough to explain why he was cutting off strips of reflective yellow card from a big roll of it and handing it to me. "The Reflective Angel says you are not reflective enough," explained the guy.

The Reflective Angel next dived into his trailer and pulled out a high-viz vest and gave it to me.

"No, its okay, really. I already have one," I protested, pointing at the one that was attached to the back of my bike. The Reflective Angel looked angry and began pulling it off.

"The Refective Angel says that your hi-viz is too old and not reflective enough. He wants you to have a new one, and you must throw that one away."

Next he pulled out some lights for me. They were very small and not very good.

"Honestly, thank you, but I don't need these. I already have lights. One pound from Poundland! They are very good." But the Reflective Angel looked at me with a fierce anger. I thought he might even hit me.

"I think it would be better if you took them anyway," said the translator, "The Reflective Angel just wants you to be safe."

The Reflective Angel was content and allowed me to leave. I asked for a photo and he consented, giving the broadest and warmest smile that he could. An undoubtedly very generous and well-intentioned young man, but also, I have to say, rather a strange one. Goodbye Reflective Angel, may you go on fighting the evil that is dull and dark surfaces.

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Patryk turned out to be an extremely nice and friendly host. He was a young man who worked in computers and had long hair and, I hope he won't mind me saying, some slightly geeky characteristics (as I already said, long hair, works in computers.) What was a little strange was that he had an extraordinarily beautiful blonde girlfriend. I'm afraid I cannot remember her name but for the purposes of the story we will call her Penny. How Patryk managed to catch a Penny would have remained a mystery to me for all time had we not had a great conversation as we walked across town to a party that made me realise that Patryk was simply a genuinely really great guy. Suddenly the mystery of the beautiful blonde girlfriend was revealed. This, I finally realised, was what could be achieved with personality. I resolved to seek one for myself.

We arrived at the party and were greeted by a tall man whose name I also can't remember, but we shall call Sheldon. Sheldon specialised in making his own alcohol and insisted on making me try a little of everything, starting with his home-made wine, but soon moving on to his home-made beer and home-made cider. I was introduced to the people at the party which I was rather disappointed to discover were primarily rather geeky men. In fact there were only two girls and they were the wife and the long-term girlfriend of a couple of the guys. 'Hmmm,' I wondered, If there are no single girls, is it still technically a party?' Whether it was a party or a gathering, either way I decided that the ensemble of characters would make for a really great sitcom. I would call it 'The Big Bang Hypothesis' or something like that.

The people were very nice and Sheldon was pressuring me to try more of his home-made concoctions and some kind of spirit was now being passed around. If I'm honest I don't usually enjoy getting completely inebriated unless there is at least one available girl for me to embarrass myself in front of, but it seemed rude to refuse. I had also made friends with a funny character with floppy hair that looked just like Shawn from 'Boy Meets World.' I can't remember his name either, I should really start taking a notepad to these events, but let's call him Shawn. The funny thing about Shawn was that he was absolutely not an intelligent geek at all (he was connected to the group as the brother of one of the girls.) He sat down next to me and we talked for much of the evening in a 'stupid-heads stick together' kind of way. He told me that he liked to cycle too, but couldn't at the moment because he had injured himself falling off his bike when he tried to change the song on his I-pod and took both hands off the handlebars. It reminded me of the time when a similar thing happened to me once in the Bahamas. Yep, stupid-heads stick together.

Shawn could still drive though and he told me all about his car and how he loved it.

"I like to cycle but I love to drive!" he said.

"I don't like cars." I replied honestly.

"I love cars. My car can do this and that and blah, blah, blah."

"Yeah, I don't actually like cars."

"What's your favourite car?"

"Erm well, like I just said, I don't re-"

"My favourite car is blah blah. It can drive blah blah and accelerate to blah blah in seven seconds and has got blah blah horsepower and blah blah cylinder engines blah blah de blah blah."

"Actually, on second thoughts, I think I will try some of that home-made vodka, thanks."