Ask me about semen analysis
It’s open week in Pathology. Coloured balloons have been attached to the walls of the lobby to greet the crowds of visitors who will descend on the department later in the week. Opposite the reception, directly in our eyeline, there is a giant poster telling you everything that you could possibly want to know about semen analysis, although from where we stand all that can be made out are the words “Semen Analysis.”
Sarah returned from two weeks holiday. Within minutes of her arrival she had reduced the new printer/photocopier/fax to a gibbering state of does not compute. I was secretly delighted by this outcome and hope that it’s a prelude to the wretched thing frying its circuits and catching fire. I also think that man’s best hope in a terminator-style war with artificially intelligent machines lies not with John Conner but with Sarah’s ability to operate on a different logic frequency from the current Hewlett Packard range.
One of the lab techs gave me a potted history of the now defunct hospital social club. Sadly I can’t repeat the story here as it’s probably libellous. It confirms my opinion of the strange dichotomy that exists within the trust, whereby staff are continually told to focus on quality of care and go above and beyond what is asked of them, while the hospital itself is one of the most ruthlessly run, cut-throat businesses I have ever come across. If you (inadvertently or otherwise) get in the way of their plans they will go through you.