The Doctor

Would you believe it but the doctor was on holiday in July. Am I ill? I phoned up last week and got through to her replacement.

We arranged for Thursday 10am. Now the great thing about the normal doctor is an almost otherworldly approach to time.

She has her first appointment at 9.00 but arrives for work at 9.30. Consequently the missus always ask for the one of the first appointments of the day and that way you get seen that day.

1140 is the one to avoid as you usually emerge anytime after 1pm because of the backlog. And people phone up while she's telling you that you've only got months to live.

It was good to see that the locum had eschewed house style by not only being in the surgery before his first appointment at 10am.

But he was ready to see me at 10am.

I went in to get a certificate which would allow me to play in the journalists' tournament at Roland Garros in September.

Last year's visit to my usual doctor for the certificate was not even in the notes. And I remember the exam was quite perfunctory.

This year the doctor asked me if I'd had an electro cardiogram. No was the reply.

As he loaded me up with the bits, a phone call came through and he just had to take it as it was the admin centre for his papers to start practising full-time at the surgery.

So there I was lying on the slab with electrodes attached to my test and he's talking to bureaucrat central. Oy what about your Hippocratic oath?

I was told to lie still while the things monitored my heart. I was motionless but one of the electrodes was getting into the groove of my heart and slipping off.

Sure enough the analysis of said heart showed I had an enlarged left ventricle. That's not bad in itself I was told. Sporty types often have this condition. What I've got to make sure is that it doesn't get dilated.

I have been given the numbers of two heart doctors who will do an ultrascan to tell me how it goes down from now on. I smell a scam here.

But given that my dad died of various complications to do with his heart and high blood pressure, you know where this might be going.

The heart doctor might well say you'll be fine just avoid playing football on a Saturday morning at 9.30 and avoid competitive tennis tournaments.

I plan to see the heart doctor in September.

The good news is that the soon-to-be-ensconced doctor at my surgery has a specialty in sports injuries. He told me this after seeing in my notes that I'd been on a couple of occasions for muscle strains.

My how we bonded over Eric Cantona and warm ups. I asked him if he played football. He said that he preferred rugby. I told him to see Looking For Eric and he spoke about the likes of Cantona and Lillian Thuram.

I chatted about interviewing Thuram for a programme at the radio station and blah blah blah we went on finally ending on if you've got any sprains or strains mate, I'm your man.

In at 1005. Out at 1115.

I think he's to the manor born.