Wednesday 11th April 2018

As I have said before, what with the amount of sickness and worse in my friends and family, I thought it only fair to myself and Jools to keep my self healthy, or at least to take it seriously. Some eight years ago, I did have tests and a small procedure to remove a growth. I should have gone for a follow up three years later, but of course, you feel healthy and put things off. Anyway, I went to see the quack a couple of weeks ago, and so an appointment at Buckland hospital came though. All I had to do was get down there for half three.

Before then there was the usual; getting up, coffee, breakfast, mid-morning coffee, elevenses, lunch and so on.

Outside the thick fog that formed overnight failed to clear, just thinned to mist, but substantive enough to keep the sun out, so appear to be dark and gloomy all day.

I wish I could tell you more, but each day working at home is pretty much like the next. The exciting part yesterday was a delivery of posts, more of which you will hear over the weekend, or next week, depending on how motivated I am to work in the garden.

The van drops the posts at the gate, and I carry them round the back. Exciting stuff I'm sure you'll agree.

I order a taxi, which comes half an hour early at half two, taking me down the Deal road into town, taking me along Coombe Valley Road on the way up to the old box factory. Much has been knocked down, new houses built, and even the hospital, the old workhouse was knocked down and rebuilt into something modern.

I go in and check in at reception, despite not being notified as to what department to go to or which doctor I was seeing. A computer voiced announcement told me to go to waiting area 2, which I did, and see people with the expression of those that have been waiting for over an hour. I sat next to a pile of magazines, but decide to wait until boredom really sets in before I delve into a year old copy of Gardeners World.

The minutes crawl by, with Steve bloody Wright burbling away on a radio, when is just audible when the room is quiet, which thankfully wasn't often. An hour passes and it is my appointment time. Nothing happens.

Half four comes round, and Jools calls: I've not been in I says. I'll come to the hospital says she.

I break and read the magazine.

Jools arrives at just gone 5, and there is just three patients left. So the nurse on reception comes round to ask us our names. And when she comes to me, her face drops. She scuttles off to get my file, then calls me into te office.

Due to an IT failure, and operating out of two offices because each computer only could either access e mails of the scan results, I slipped through the gap. The doctor had left an hour before. I would have to come back another day. She was mortified, and kept apologising. I told her to step, getting angry wouldn't make things better, so better just go home.

I prepare aubergine again, to go with the left over pasta salad. I decide it's a wine night, one box or two was the only question. It had been a bad day.

In the evening, I followed the CL games, some exciting, but Real coming through to snatch qualification with a last minute goal in a 3-1 defeat to Juve. And HE scored.

Time for bed, if only my mind would rest, as I worried about work for the first time in years.