The King of Naff

How did I start Good Friday? I bit the head off my Easter bunny. I hasten to add that the bunny is a chocolate one, so don't worry. No harm was done to any animals, real or imagined. Well-only a chocolate one. I buy the Lindt ones, and this sat on my kitchen table for about five days...if it could have spoken, it would have said "eat me, eat me". I did well to wait until 6:00 this morning. And it is still sitting on my kitchen counter, looking very forlorn. Well-it would be looking forlorn if it had a head, which it most unfortunately does not. Good thing I didn't give up chocolate for Lent. Or anything else, for that matter, since I polished off a bag of Kettle Chips last night. And good for me, too.

I have a "naff meter"-I've had this for years, and I find that it keeps me sane (ish). I simply consign people and situations to naff, really naff, and naffed out. I went to see Andy (the minister) on Wednesday, and when you read what happened I think you'll agree that he goes well off the naff scale. I could think of a few other four letter words, but naff will do at the moment.

He phoned me and told me that people were telling him that I was really angry. He wanted to hear it from me personally. So I told him I was, and I reminded him that I had told him in church that I was very offended by his going and forming the yellow shirts (what I call his "love" group). The problem is that nothing sinks in with Andy; he suffers from what I call selective memory: he conveniently forgets what you tell him if it goes against what he wants to believe. So many people are like that-but he is a minister, he is supposed to be above such naff behavior.

So I went to see him on Wednesday morning-and it was the longest and most unpleasant hour I have had since I had to sit in the hospital waiting to have my blood taken. That was like a trip to the Bahamas when compared with listening to Andy. He wanted to know about this mass in my abdomen. He then asked me if I had made any funeral arrangements. Did I want a Church of England funeral? He smirked at that. Did I want music? What kind? Did I want a "living will"? And when I moved the conversation away from sickness (he has decided that I am on death's door. Now I feel like it), he said that if I want to help the social justice team I should chain myself to a fence in central London and contact the press and say that a dying woman is making a stand about the cuts in the NHS. I had to laugh at that...and I finally had enough, said I had to leave. I didn't really want him to decide to help send my on my way...

Well - naffness is everywhere. Actually, that wasn't naff. That was just plain obnoxious and nasty. So I am rethinking whether or not I want to return to the Unitarians. Excuse me if I'm not going to chain myself anywhere. And-I won't know what this mass in my abdomen is until someone decides to cut me open and find out. I think they can do keyhole and remove it. If not, I will consider if I can live with it. I really doubt that it is malignant. Either way, I will deal with the facts when I know the facts.

Did I tell you that Barts Trust has had to sack the CEO, CFO and Chief Medical Officer? If I did, just nod off for a few minutes, because I will chalk that up to CRS.. The facts: Barts has lost 500 million pounds. That is what I said: 500 million pounds. Sterling. How do you lose 500 million pounds in a year? You can't really hide it in your mattress and forget about it, can you? So where did it go?

And what they are now doing is cutting services and cutting staff to try to make up that loss. I am already facing a cut in the amount of immunoglobulin I receive. So it is only a matter of time-according to my nurse, John-before the immunology service is discontinued, and becomes a part of some other hospital. Where? Who knows? Welcome to the NHS. They're Brits. So they're about 18 on the naff scale that runs from 1-10. They're just too stupid to know it.

When this joke of a general election is over and we have either the current moron (Cameron) as Prime Minister or some other moron, I will be able to actually go out and do something besides go to hospital appointments. My professional patient calendar finishes just at the election. So I will have most of the summer to play. I will be so free, I won't know what to do with myself.

Maybe I should get a stash of Lindt chocolate bunnies to go with my stash of Kettle Chips. I might get really fat-but boy, will I ever be happy!! (And I'm not planning on dying just yet. Maybe when I'm 100 and riding down the Pacific Coast Highway on my Harley. What a way to make an exit!).