MEDICAL MATTERS

It happened that today both pa and myself had medical appointments, I with the practice nurse at our local surgery and Pa with an consultant at the Hospital in town. This fact tended to fragment the day somewhat but we have become used to such happenings and so managed to work around the problem.

Not being allowed to drive has been the cause of much trouble during the past few years. In order to get to hospital Pa has rely on hospital transport which can be at best erratic and at worst non existent. Today with an appointment at three in the afternoon at a hospital no more than twelve miles away Pa was told to be ready at noon.......on the off chance that the transport might be a little early! A little!!!

Since more often than not the transport is late the inconvenience of having to rush around in the morning in order sit about twiddling ones thumbs for a couple of hours seems to me to be, not to put too fine a point on it taking the piss!

For myself with only a short buggy ride to the surgery all would have been well had not the weather proved to be ghastly. The usual gale was blowing (no surprises there) but the wind carried with it at times driving rain, at others large hail stones or snow and quite often all three. Getting soaked was inevitable and as there is no where under cover to park my buggy the prospect of a wet backside was less than inviting!

Pa's transport arrived barely in time to get him to hospital for his appointment and an hour later I set out for the surgery. It was my lucky day for not only did the rain hold off, but the scales informed me that during Christmas I had not put on any weight at all, nothing short of a miracle!

Pa's appointment war for two thirty and so at the outside with transport home we would have expected him back between five and five thirty and Pa was to call us when the taxi arrived. At five thirty he called to tell us the his transport had not showed up, the reception desk was unmanned and he was, to all intents and purposes stranded.

Well of course we called a taxi to collect him and within ten minutes the cab had arrived, a journey of around eight country miles with no rush hour traffic should have taken less than half an hour. So you may imagine our concern when an hour later he had not arrived home and had not called to tell us why.

In such circumstances the imagination goes in to overdrive and we envisaged poor old pa lying on a deserted country lane amidst the tangle wreckage of the cab. Finally at ten minutes to eight he rocked up as if he was not late at all. He was, he said feeling rather sick as were we all since none of us had eaten since early in the morning and dinner was now three hours late.

At this juncture I still have no idea what the outcome of his appointment was, nor do I know,why he missed his transport or what the bloody hell took him so long to get home.

One thong is certain, there will be no late afternoon appointments, this is not the first time he has been left high and dry in this manner. Tomorrow I shall be issuing a stern reprimand to those concerned and sending well deserved rocket to the Transport department.

It has been a long day , we are all tired and I expect that as usual I shall be up half the night making coffee for Pa and ,most likely preparing him some food as he refused to eat dinner in spite of the fact that we had awaited hours in order to eat with him.

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I have since discovered that he ate a sandwich at the hospital and my sympathy has totally evaporated....in light of this information the fact that he has since been sick comes as no surprise. Any one who voluntarily eats hospital food deserves all they get.

Now I mean to take a shower before something worse befalls.

Please excuse my rant, I expect it is the relief of getting Pa home safely after all.........silly old bugger!!!!!!!!!