The Doctor’s Waiting Room
Sounds like the title of an upcoming horror film and let me tell you – it felt like I was in a horror film this morning as I sat in my doctor’s waiting room for 30 minutes, surrounded by sick people.
I’ll start at the beginning – I’m not sick. I just had to go in to get another prescription, so I booked my appointment for 11am and arrived nice and early. I don’t know why I do that – force of habit perhaps? – because everybody knows that doctors always run late. Anyway. I went over to the desk to “check-in” and noticed a large bottle of hand sanitiser sitting there, half empty. Next to that was a sign stating that if you had flu-like symptoms, you were required to wear a mask during your wait in the waiting room, and you weren’t allowed to sneeze or breathe on people.
Oh, that’s right… swine flu chaos.
I went and sat in a seat near the door. Absent-mindedly, I reached for a magazine … and something stopped me. I suddenly saw, not magazines, but the millions of germs people have left on them. I slowly sat back in my seat, arms carefully folded across my chest.
A man to the left of me was sniffling into a tissue. A woman across the room was yawning without covering her mouth. An elderly lady on the other side was scratching her arm.
I had a sudden urge to turn and run.
I’m not a germaphobe. I get that you’ve got a certain level of germs in everyday life, but at this point in time I was starting to debate whether or not I really needed this prescription. Every time I breathed in, I could almost see the germs entering my body. I was starting to freak myself out.
I talked sense into myself and, while I left the magazines alone, I began to breathe normally again. This was ridiculous. The whole swine flu thing is ridiculous. But just to be on the safe side, I helped myself to a nice dollop of sanitiser before I left. And I used my shirt to open the door, without even thinking.
How do you feel about this whole swine flu thing?
I was once in a waiting room like that. There was a hand-sanitizer dispenser where you walk in and a sign – “Please use sanitizer before approaching desk.”
A lady came in with two crutches .. the kind that you hold with your hands and that don’t come up inside your armpits. She stopped .. looked at the sign .. looked at her crutches … if she took her hands off she would fall .. I think she skipped the cleanser. There was a lady asleep there. The receptionist finally hollered “Ethel!” “Ethel, wake up!” Ethel looked up. The receptionist said “Ethel, your appointment was yesterday!” Ethel said “Oh – well then I’ll come back tomorrow!” … thankfully my name was then called!
….Rabbits’ Guy´s last post ..NORMALLY ….
Rabbit’s Guy – That waiting room sounds awesome! I wonder if Ethel ever got her appointment? Lol .. The funniest part of my waiting room experience was watching as a young man went up to the desk and complained that his appointment was at 11am and it was now 11:15am! The receptionist looked at him funny and said, “This is a Doctors surgery. They are never on time!” So true!