Friday, July 16, 2010

Tobogganing all the way to the X-Ray machine...

Cripes, apologies for the lack of blogoloy yesterday for those of you that sit at home sucking tissues until I update you with the illuminating progressions of my life. It's been a funny couple of days.

So...to start with the trip to see the back doctor. I was already vaguely dreading the visit as not only was I going to have to explain that I have ceremoniously avoided getting my spinal damage medically checked for 7 months, but I was also going to have to explain that I incurred the damage whilst dressed as an elf, tobogganing in Lapland. Not the easiest thing to do whilst trying to encourage someone to take you seriously enough to give you morphine. But I actually encountered something I had not expected.

Have you ever had to explain to someone from a very hot country what tobogganing is?

It turned out my doctor was fairly new in the country from Africa, and while eager to help me out of my misery she hadn't the faintest idea what toboganning was and so needed some more information. I was trying desperately not to ask her if she'd ever seen the film 'Cool Runnings'. It turns out tobogganing isn't really that easy to explain.

"You know, when you sit on a tray and go down a hill?"
Silence.
"A bit like skiing but sat down?"
Silence.
"Well, I was working as an elf...and we had some time off. So we went tobogganing."
Silence.
"Which is fun, I promise. You sort of sit in a plastic box and gooooooooo."
Silence.
"It's very safe, usually."
Frown.
"Except, it's always dark in Lapland, so I couldn't see where I was going."
Disapproving frown.
"And it was quite icy, so I went a bit faster than we expected."
Raised eyebrows.
"Ok, a lot faster"
Silence.
"There's a video if it helps...?"
Silence.
"It probably won't help...but it's pretty funny."
Silence.
"So it was dark, and I was tobogganing. Which is sort of like go karting but with snow and no wheels...and no steering. And it was dark. And someone had left a mound of snow at the bottom of the toboggan run..."
Silence.
"Well, I say 'left', I mean it was a safety precaution because there's a main road at the bottom of the toboggan run."
Raised eyebrows.
"But, it's perfectly safe - tobogganing's a bit like surfing but you can't usually drown."
Silence.
"Only, the mound of snow didn't stop me - it just sort of taught me to fly. But I haven't grasped landing yet. Which really it ought to have taught me first. And that is why I'm here."
Silence.
"Because my back hurts. Here...(at which point I pointed to my back, pointedly). Ow."

She wasn't mightily impressed and suggested I take pain killers.

"It's sort of like skateboarding but you don't have to wear a baseball cap..."

I implied that I'd been taking pain killers for the last 7 months, and while I enjoyed the debate as to whether aspirin was extending my life or not, I'd prefer a cure to a cocktail.

She gave me a pink slip to take to the hospital and ask for an x-ray.

I'm taking the video with me to the hospital - just for safe measure.

"It's sort of like a death slide on a Zoom lolly?"
"Please get off the bed now."

No comments:

Post a Comment