Happy New Year!

One of the things about blogging is that you can do this anywhere in the world, ideally on a sun lounger post yoga retreat when you’ve found yourself, or maybe somewhere glamorous like New York, or in the London coffee shop of your choice so that you can fool people into thinking you’re not just checking Tinder (more on that another time) and you really are just writing the final chapter of the novel you have always had the title for.

As I’m about to prove, you can indeed blog from anywhere if your hands are small enough to cradle an i-phone and your eyesight is good.

I’m in the waiting room at a London hospital and I’m going to tell you all about it.

Moving back to London last year was an interesting process and I’ve already sampled the delights of the Royal Free A and E which is the Ritz of healthcare, having just been refurbed.

As it’s January, asthma is back to playing hide and seek and this time I can’t hide. I’ve drained my inhalers, taken my steroids (super powers awaited), and nothing has improved after a day of me wondering if Anyone would notice if I took my bra off at work so I could breathe more deeply. (Fear not, I discounted this idea quickly).

I got here via an admin journey guaranteed to make your eyes prick with tears. First, a call to my GP here (after I spent time on their automated system offering me an appointment next week, who then got someone to call me back, but who couldn’t stick around to see me: “the surgery’s closing”, although I could have been there in 10 minutes. I was told to call NHS 111 and they told me to come here, but that was a while back now. I was “out of the catchment” for another medical centre.

If you ever call NHS 111, you’re in for a maze of questions. This is to check you aren’t having a heart attack or stroke, but if you were, I would worry about your chances of surviving that call. This is before they tell you to sit up straight to help your breathing, and not to take anyone else’s medication. I confirmed that I do have to take steroids, but not for body building.

I was also asked about whether I had had a baby recently and if I was on the Pill. I’m delighted that 111 has a more optimistic view of my personal life than I do and I was sad to say no so many times to the kind man who also asked me if I had a v****** ring as part of the assessment process. First time for everything.

(I felt quite excited at this point, because I thought of party rings, which are lovely biscuits. But alas it was not to be.)

Before I put you off biscuits for life, let me tell you about the waiting room. It’s lovely and clean. You could buy a non alcoholic drink from the vending machine and there’s a sandwich I have my eye on, too.

There aren’t enough chairs for those waiting so I’m standing up because I would feel bad if I didn’t. This has also enabled me to admire UCLH’s core values, displayed behind reception:

Safety, Kindness, Teamwork, Improving.

The pedantic part of me wants to suggest “improvement” as an alternative, but that would be churlish. And as I’m always banging on about Kindness, I’m probably in the right place. I might suggest though that they add “worth the wait” to the sign, though, and check the drinks machine for mixed doubles.

Sipping on a tin of gin and tonic would probably make it worth the wait, after all. Chuck in a bag of crisps and I’ll stay all night, but let’s hold the Party Rings for now.

Happy New Year!