Notes from  a hospital ward

Having spent the last couple of days in hospital with a severe ear infection with the right side of my face swollen like a pumpkin ( it is after all Halloween) it’s funny how quickly one loses track of time and place. I have no idea if it is light or dark, sunny, rainy, there could have been a freak blizzard for all I know as haven’t glimpsed daylight /night sky since I got here.Its a bit like being on a cruise ship though sadly without the entertainment (Steve Rawlings). And it’s impossible to get any sleep whatsoever.Last night I got a new neighbour who seems to have his neck stapled together.. Obviously he needs regular attention but the trouble is this involves the main light being turned on each time and his curtains round his bed being swished open, his bed being cranked up with the best Hammer house of horror creak.Then the nurses come to check my blood pressure and temperature and give me more drugs.Poor stapled man moans all night ( as I would, with a stapled neck) and he has a machine going that sounds like a washing machine … Maybe it is.In my morphine be fuddled state anything is possible .Each morning I get wheeled upstairs to the torture chamber ( ear clinic) to see Raj, the ear specialist .He sticks a long pipe into my infected ear and tries to suck as much gunk as he can out before I start screaming .Not recommended for a fun way to pass the time of day.But the nurses are brilliant and everyone very kind towards slightly deranged mad woman who snivels a lot.And then I meet the lovely woman in the bed opposite who has serious heart problems with all sorts of drips and wires and has been in this ward for a month.There’s me hoping I might get out this weekend and she is hoping she might get out by Christmas .I am indeed very lucky all round