Nutters frequent Arts and Music settings because they blend in better with the crowds. We had a pair at the art college I attended. The younger one believed he was a secret agent, and was following a ragged elderly man who, it turned out, was exactly what he claimed to be - a university engineering professor who'd done one too many hits of sixties acid.

The 'secret agent' got somewhat straightened out by the medical establishment - I say somewhat since last I saw him he was a mall security guard and still exuded a very furtive manner.

The engineer had quite brilliant ideas, (he carried pencilled diagrams, including one of a device he'd designed for licking up oil spills) and showed up every spring for years, having holed up with his family for the winter. I recall walking down a main street with a newish boyfriend one spring day, and seeing the prof hiding behind a tree in the Public Gardens, peeking out every few seconds to smile and wave. Boyfriend was rather horrified when I immediately dashed in to have a happy chat with this old, very dirty, mostly toothless and decidedly smelly fellow. He had a poem for me he'd written months before. Finest nutter I have ever known, rest his soul.