Hospital.

This is Aberdeen Royal Infirmary.  In Fraserburgh we have a small A&E.  But if you need to see a consultant and/ or have an operation you have to go to ARI.  Aberdeen from here is 41.2 mile and takes 59 minutes , according to google.  This does not take into account the roads one uses, the current ongoing dualling of that road, the bottlenecks which still remain despite many road improvements and then doing battle at the hospital which has limited parking, even more limited as they attempt to redress all that by building a multistorey car park.

So by the time you get there you are exhausted.  The DP does the driving.  Had I just been going to Dunelm I could cope but getting there for an appointment - no.  My appointment was at 2.15. ( in the pink zone.)  The DP had to drop me off with chariot and then find somewhere to park.  I went to the most disgusting disabled loo which stank, was airless and very claustrophobic.  We had driven through torrential cloud bursts but Aberdeen was sunny and hot.  The hospital had the heating on full tilt.  I must remember to wear nothing but jama bottoms and a vest when I go there again.  So as I headed off to the pink zone my breathing had a lot to be desired.  I managed it.

Waiting room.  Daytime t.v. Now I know why I do not watch it.  Plus there was the mental agony of there being no lip sync.

The DP eventually turned up.  I was just heading off with a nurse who said " She will be about an hour as this is her second cataract op and we have all her details."  Whoopy do.  So the DP buggared off for an hour.

So question and answers, wee sample, bp test oxygen levels, bad, then I got asked questions I have never been asked before.  "Tell  me the months of the year backwards from the end."  So I did.  Then it was how old are you?  What year is this?  So after proving I was compos mentis...... Also eye test, ok for driving as my left bionic eye zoomed through the examination.  Right eye - zilch.  Back to the waiting room and more of looking for a very expensive house in Cornwall.  On the t.v. Which was quite interesting as I used to live in Cornwall.

The next was into another room and  I was told that as I had been through all this before they had the measurements for the bad eye, I do hope the eye doesnt change then in two years.  So back into the waiting room. By which time we were onto 'Flog it'  Never seen that before.  What a dubious set of experts.  Fortunately the last bit in the last room was putting drops in my eyes so my sight was blurred.

I then had to wait to see THE CONSULTANT.  Who was so clever I was placed out of order.  So - remember - the DP had been told, an hour, we got there at 2.00 for a 2.15 appointment and it was 4.45 before I saw the consultant.  But being British and a Labour Party Supporter I said nothing.  So a 6 month waiting now for the actual operation.  It will take us that long to have recovered from today....I am to have extra general anaesthetic as apparently on the last op I 'grabbed' a lot.  You hold onto a nurses hand as you are not allowed to speak, from memory I grabbed as I was fed up of hearing the blow by blow account of how we are cutting into your eye rather than any discomfort but hey ho.  I am also liable to be left blind, have to have it all again, some sort of liquid stuff could emerge which could mean the operation takes longer than 30 minutes, sign here. I did.

I came out. The DP went to find the car and pick me up.  There were two cars double parked in the ambulance bay having dropped off some glamorous female who hot footed in to the hospital.  I took great pleasure in standing there with chariot shouting "Oy piss off."

And they did.

We then had another hour of traffic to get home.  And the wine.

Sue, Col and everyone else who has to visit hospitals on a regular basis you have my total admiration.