Where's Dr House when you need him??

February 23.
Not content with the breast drill and nail gun biopsy routine, She Who Knows Best, i.e. my wonderful Dr Ward decided that more investigation was needed. "Into the MRI machine with you," she declared, so my pal M. volunteered to spend the morning at the hospital while I was subjected to yet another horrendously expensive torture.

MRIs are those machines that all Dr House's patients end up in sooner or later, while the doctors have meaningful conversations about their love lives as the patient has a seizure. Let me just tell you first of all that not everyone goes into the MRI machine lying comfortably on their back to have a mid-morning snooze. The MRI room looks like something in a nuclear bunker..... DANGER. DO NOT CROSS THE LINE. Yellow tape and buzzers. All high security so you feel a bit weird standing there in your underwear.

I'm not quite sure why I found it so irritating to be called "honey" and "sweetie" by someone by daughters' age as I lay face down, clad only in white knickers, boobs hanging through holes in the table, arms stretched above my head like a diver, but I did. I'm sorry. She was really very nice. I'm not one for too much formality, but I think in the circumstances I would have liked a bit more respect. "Are you all right, Mrs.....?" as the machine hammered and clattered, ear-splittingly, for 45 minutes.

When it was finally over and she came to help me up, I said "Wow, how do older people keep still in that position for so long?". She looked at me oddly. If ever there was a disconnect, this was it. She obviously couldn't fathom why I, an older person, would ask such a dumb question. I, on the other hand, am no way an older person.... I was talking about seriously older people, like my mother, for goodness sakes. Oh my. Treacherous territory.....