[rant alert]
Tell you what, though, it isn't half a kerfuffle finding a stolen bike.
You see it up a fairly secluded pathway, you wonder what it's doing there, you have a good look around to see if there may be an owner nearby, You see it's got locks on, but they're not attached to the railings it's leaning against. You don't want to just pick it up and take it home because that would be pretty indistinguishable from theft. Then you remember you don't have your phone on you, run back home and up 67 steps to get your phone and out again, then you remember you can't phone 999 but, equally, you can't remember the non-emergency number. You see someone coming down the pathway and ask them. They suggest 101, I phone them and it's the NHS. So you phone 999 and as soon as you say it's not an emergency, you know you're wasting police time, but you think they can tell you what number you can ring, so I asked for the non emergency number, and all they're going to give is the directory enquiries (FFS, that number is longer than the non-emergency number, why not save time and cut your losses?) So you decide you should simply take it home, find the right number for the non-emergency line, so it's back up the 67 steps with a bike on the shoulder, find the number and set off on the original journey, phoning the police on the way. As you're walking down the street, you phone the number and explain how you've put a suspected stolen bike in a secure place and they tell you to phone give you a call reference number and tell you to take it to Deptford police station, and you explain that with two locks on it and not having a car to stick it in, they're going to have to come and get it. This is when you realise you don't have a pen on you so you get them to repeat the call reference and you try to memorise it (I'll have dreams about CAD 6742 from now on). When you get home, while you're on your bottom rubbing the road dirt off the bottom of the bottom bracket to see if there's a serial number (no), you notice that the bike's been Bike Registered and there's a Bike Register sticker on the down tube. You find the number - once you've found you glasses - and phone them. And the lass who answers sounds like it's the first time anyone not in a uniform has reported a found bike before. Maybe it's the first time anyone has reported a found bike before, who knows, but anyway I ask them for the number of Deptford Police Station. . And she tells me to phone the non-emergency number (I really don't remember whether it's 121 or 101 anymore) for the station. Hang on, I've just phoned that number and got told to take the bike there. Is there nobody on earth who will give me their number? No, 101 or 121, whichever, is the only number they've got. Though there should be a bike register number written on the frame. So, down I go under the down tube and I read out the first number I see. Then I realise that's the number I've just phoned, so I give them the other number. They, one of these days, will notify that bike number to the Deptford Police Station to let them know and Deptford Police Station will phone me to arrange collection. Which they don't. So, on my way out for the evening, I decide to ride off to DPS to give them the BR number. At the bottom of my 67 stairs I realise I've got a puncture, and as it was just meant to be a very local trip I've got neither pump nor patches on me. So it's back up the 67 steps with a bike on my shoulder to get the bike back in order and back down again to restart. After a lengthy wait at the copshop, I'm assured that someone will contact me this evening. Which, naturally, they haven't.
There must be easier ways to find a bike. Maybe the fubicly punded services could help us help them. Nicking bikes must be so much easier.
[here endeth tonight's rant]