Not A Good Day...To Put It Mildly.

I´ve been writing/telling practically everyone I know who´ll read/listen how I´ve just spent the most frustrating and infuriating morning ever at the doctor´s surgery. Sat for 1 1/2 hours in the waiting room until it was entirely empty but for me. Had no breakfast due to a blood test which didn´t actually get done until 11.30...meanwhile my blood sugar was so low I was about to pass out. When it was eventually done it just had to be Miss Impertinence herself, a sort of medical Wicked Witch Of The West, who did it, complaining all the while about how inconvenient it was for HER at this late hour(!) I could have said that I arrived before 10 but enjoyed sitting in the waiting room so much I told the receptionist just to leave me there for a while, but I couldn´t be bothered and, besides, you don´t argue with an irrational woman with a needle in her hand no matter how irritating she is. Nobody - apart from me and, of course, my doctor - knew I had to have various other tests and nobody thought to just ask the doctor so they weren´t done at all. In fact they wouldn´t even have done the blood test if I hadn´t looked so threatening when I said through clenched teeth that I hadn´t gone without my usual 3 cups of coffee and my croissant just to have a torture device (soon to be explained) strapped onto my arm. I´ll have to get the problem of the undone tests sorted out on Monday at my next appointment. I eventually left the surgery shortly before 12 wearing one of those portable blood pressure torture gadgets which buzzed frantically and grabbed my arm in a vice-like grip every time I had to do something which required not only concentration but full use of both of my arms. Just try overtaking on a fast main road with the feeling you´ve got a noisy boa constrictor wrapped around your arm. Need I say more?

It took 2 cups of coffee and a croissant before I started to feel human again. The frustration started to build up all over again when I decided to change my clothes - having got wet to the skin during the short sprint from my car to my front door – and discovered that Miss Impertinence´s absent-minded colleague had attached the torture device to my bra in such a way that I couldn´t take it off. I do mean my bra by the way and not the torture device! And, no, it didn´t even occur to me to simply snip through a strap with scissors. I paid €60 for that garment only a couple of months ago. I had to wait until the next loud buzz forewarned me that it – the torture device, not the bra! - was about to go through its boa constrictor act again and immediately it let my arm go I quickly unplugged it, untangled my bra from it and plugged it in again. Of course without my underwear to support it the cable is completely out of control and impedes just about every movement I make. What I really needed was a long relaxing soak in a hot bath and that of course was a definite no-no. Miss Impertinence´s colleague had actually found it necessary to tell me not to shower or have a bath which was about the only time I laughed today. No, I tell a lie. The second time was when she told me it had been known to happen.

I was just thinking that the worst of the day was over when I opened an email from a friend in Scotland who told me that my alma mater, the beautiful Mackintosh Glasgow School Of Art, was on fire. That was such a catastrophic piece of news after such a horrible morning that I finally broke down completely. It took a while before I managed to pull myself together, wipe the tears from my face and get on with it. Then there came another email with a story which I found so incredibly touching I just had to share it with someone, you in fact, assuming you´ve got this far in my tale of woe.

In central Glasgow there´s a statue of a fireman and some person unknown has hung a notice around his neck which in immaculate Mackintosh style script simply says “Thank you.” As my friend said, “How lovely and how Glasgow.”