CHEERS BIG EARS.

In the words of the great Churchillian leader, John Major........  "I'm still here".

To follow on from yesterday I am still lying in a hospital bed suffering from Cellulitis. Whilst this sounds like a condition involving too much fat on the thighs it is actually an infection of the skin, in my case and fairly commonly around the ear.  The effect is to cause the ear to appear as if it has been smashed about in a rugby scrum for the last 20 years. Additionally it is bright red and burning causing my face to swell and invoked a fever. So all in all not a lot of fun. I went on to Google to find a photo but none of them were close to how bad mine is so here it is.......

As you can see I have a very big ear, this is not because of the infection, I just have big ears. No, no, I'm lying, well I do have large ears but not this large. It looks like a trainee at Madame Tussauds has supplied the ear.

Oh and yes it is very painful but the pain killers do a pretty good job.

There are a lot of Surgeons roaming the ward in a hungry pack and seeing the guy in the corner bed with his two legs and a finger amputated I am of a mind not to take a nap just at this time.



The Boxer from yesterday has gone home now and the Polish guy next to me is stuffing M&M's into his mouth by the handful. Above him a sign reads "NIL BY MOUTH".  Elton John is sitting in a bed diagonally opposite to me, well he is a spitting image of him including the dodgy hair and he even sounds like him (but he is not singing).

The nurse is putting up a sign above a bed she has just prepared for a new patient, it has pictures of cakes on it and says "EXTRA SNACKS". I think I might carry out a quick swop when she goes.

Hospitals are just so surreal aren't they? So completely at odds to The Old Bakery or anybody's normality, especially when you are plucked away from that normality so unexpectedly. Everything is so alien, the surroundings, the regime and then the side effects of the drugs. I hate it here but thank god for what they do eh?


Throughout the day most of the other patients are having exercises with the Occupational Therapists. I'm feeling a little left out. Do they not do exercises for the ears then? Perhaps a wiggle or two.

For their convenience I have two IV pipes dangling from my arm so they can inject the three different penicillins into me. They have a tendency to dangle awkwardly and I have just reached across my soup to pick up the bread roll only to have them plop into my Leek and Potato soup. So the next batch of penicillin will be loaded with extra vitamins.

Back in the real world (The Old Bakery) Alison, Claire and Stephen have been holding the fort and looking after all the guests needs. This is particularly tough on Alison as she has worked a full week already and this should be her Bank Holiday weekend off. By all accounts the guests are really complimentary about their hospitality and they have even asked how I am doing and I won't even get to meet them now.

So like a child at bedtime it is now time for lights out and I am getting ready for the nightly bedpan stock-take at 2am.
I have just tuned into my old favourite the Hospital Radio and the presenter (not one of which can be under 70 years old, surely they should be in bed too) has just announced in that slow indecisive and slightly confused way....

"Thanks to errr Dan on ummm Dunstan ward who has asked for errr  (uncomfortably long pause), something from the Ted   Heath   Orchestra......."


Yeh, thanks very much Dan, thanks very much indeed!





Some other big ears that I recently photographed with his friend.........

A Red Legged Partridge and his pal a Hare near Hunworth

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