Octopus's Garden

Issue Sixty

6th April 2006

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Sub-editorial

HELLO, good evening and welcome to Octopus’s Garden, the subzeen with its very own medical bulletin. It’s a subzeen to Jim Burgess’ The Abbysinian Prince. Produced by Peter Sullivan, peter@burdonvale.co.uk. It's available on the web at http://www.burdonvale.co.uk/octopus/index.html.

The English Patient

As hinted at by Jim, I have been not a tall well.

For a couple of months, I had been getting throat pains when walking moderate distances outside. I assumed it was just a particularly tenacious winter bug of some kind, but eventually went to see the doctor about it in late December. Within a week, I’d been sent to the Chest Pain Clinic at the local hospital, diagnosed with potential Angina, and booked in for an angiogram in January to confirm or deny this. The results of the angiogram were such that I wasn’t allowed home, and stayed as an in-patient for a week before being transferred to another hospital for an urgent angioplasty. After a further week’s recuperation at home, I was back at work and now feel fine, but am being more careful with my diet and have also been signed up for some special cardiac gym classes.

All of this has been further documented, probably at tedious length, in a series of mini-zines called FAFIA (for "Forced Away From It All.") These were originally distributed via e-mail, but are now available on the web at http://www.efanzines.com/FAFIA/.

But the thing about being in hospital is that you will start to write lots of sentences starting "The thing about being is hospital is..."

So you see, the thing about being in hospital is that it’s like being on a very, very long intercontinental plane flight. Consider:

• You don’t get to go anywhere for your meals, you get them brought to you. There may be a notional choice, but in practice pretty much everything ends up tasting like chicken.
• You’re not actually meant to go and get anything yourself, but are expected to use the call bell as and when you need to.
• There are frequent events to help break up the day – blood pressure checks, doctor’s visits and the like in one case, distribution of visa forms and the duty-free trolley in the other.
• You tend to save up going to the bathroom as a little treat, and an opportunity to stretch your legs.
• Whilst everyone else is watching TV, I betray my roots by reading instead.

Of course, the analogy doesn’t necessarily work perfectly – I can’t remember ever having to have needles stuck in me to take blood during any of the flights I’ve been on.

That was Octopus's Garden #60, a Startling Press production.