Tick Tock

Not happy, very cross, kind of scared, but all safe now, so much calmer

EMB is still in foreign I’m here at the homestead doing the things that need doing. Went to the Dr tonight, the health centre (HC) I go to is in not the best of areas, we’re talking shootings here. Got the bus there, appointment was a 16.40, hoped to be out be 17.00. To get there I have to use an underpass, which is okish in the daylight, not something I going to do at night. But at 17.00 it’ll be ok & I’d be back for 17.30 & all would be well.

Got called to see the Dr at 17.30, luckily I had nothing better to do than wait, or something. The clock on the display is still wrong, but I only mention it every time I go in, so not that often!

So, outside the HC, where it’s enclosed and little I call a private hire company which I normally use. You have to remember I always use these guys for taxi from this side of the city. I’ve caught a taxi the past 3 mornings, that’s £14 a day, they were late 2 out of 3 but moving on.

So call them up for a car, “sorry love, don’t know where that HC is” what! There are about 10 Dr's, 3 nurses, physiotherapist and heath care workers based here. It’s not a small place.

“Where are you near” so I tell her, the name of the road, get told it’s a long road, which I did already know. Get asked what else I can see, tell her the name of a pub on the road, not the nicest of pubs, all boarded windows and cans on the tables from what I can see through the door.

“Oh yes, now I know where you are, wait by the road and we’ll have some one with you in 5 minutes”. So not nice but I do need to get home, it’s 17.40, it’s dark, is cold, but taxi is the only way! So wait by the road, between the HC and the pub (about 20 meters apart).

10 minutes: call again “he’s gone love, you weren’t there” yes I was, told her this, she said she’d try and get him back but there’d be some one with me in 5 minutes, which means 15 minutes in the cold by the time they get there.

20 minutes: call again “any minute now love, he’s just pulling up”.

25 minutes: “we’ve passed the job on love” which means they’d passed it to a different firm, getting cold and scared now.

30 minutes: car from new different firm pulls up, chap goes “Principal Cars” and my address, I get in the car and have a little breakdown. Chap tries to calm me down, asks how long I’d been waiting, & why I was waiting there. So I told him, he seemed actually shocked, said he’d not pass any more of his jobs through to them.

More talk where I’m calmed down on the way home, he said he know where the health centre was & next time wait there & then they’d come get me. So I took a card, paid and got out, feeling better, which was nice. Not every day you manage to find a new good thing