I needed to go to the surgery today. For some reason the skin around my elbows has gone all weird and painful. I'm finding it really hard to bend my right arm at all. I've been keeping it straight as much as possible. It's a nightmare trying to perform menial tasks like washing up and doing your laces, and I can't even walk down the high-street without everyone thinking I'm waving them offside. But it is very good for yo-yo practice; as long as you find a willing friend to help you get going.
 It's always the same when you get an unusual injury - you realise just how much you miss having the injured part of your body in its normal state. I'd never really considered the elbows to be a key player (compared to, say, hands or eyes) but life is thoroughly awkward without them. Now I know how robots feel.
 Our local surgery has just introduced a touch-screen signing-in system. You walk in and stand at the front of the silent waiting room and try and work out how to operate this clumsy piece of equipment. And, naturally, everyone sits and watches you struggle. Well, it's more interesting to watch someone struggle than read the literature on offer (Jehovah's Witness magazines, some issues of Country Living from early 2003, and pamphlets with titles like 'Dementia: Who's Next?' and 'Meningitis: It Could Be You,' as though just by turning up we've all been entered in some frenzied health lottery.) 
 I'm all for time-saving initiatives in surgeries but this new touch-screen system is rendered pointless by the fact that sat two feet away from it is a receptionist twiddling her thumbs. I can't see how making everyone type in an array of details onto a screen is quicker than leaning over the counter and saying 'Ryan Pugh, half-three, Dr Fry.' And considering how much the NHS is warning us about the spread of swine flu through human contact, a touch-screen sign-in service has a whiff of derring-do about it.
 Gosh, but it's not much fun waiting in those places. Every time I hear someone cough I shift uncomfortably in my seat, convinced that if I don't breathe in for the next three minutes I won't catch a strain of H5N1. Every time the loud beep interrupts the quiet, we all dart our attention to the little notice screen to see if it's  our name that's being displayed. When you look up and see that is in fact Mrs P. Merrywether or Mr T. King who is being called you suddenly become bizarrely envious - even though judging by the way Mr King has been coughing he's probably only got the best part of a fortnight left.
 Every time I've ever been in the surgery waiting room I have always sat opposite someone that I went to school with but never talked to. And you can tell they're trying to avoid you as much as you're trying to avoid them. Today was no different. Although today I had to wait for the loud beep and the person's name to come on the notice screen to confirm it, but it was definitely somebody I went to school with and never spoke to. Why you can't bump into people you actually spoke to at school I don't know. Perhaps the doctors look at a secret dossier containing every move you've ever made and arrange appointments that ensure this never happens because they like the idea of a depressing waiting room. 
 The nurse I saw was actually something of a looker. When she said 'Tell me, Mr Pugh, do you use your elbow very often?' I felt like I was in a Carry On film. I expected to hear a swallow whistle every time she spoke. I was tempted to answer: 'Oooh, yes, but only on weekends.' I resisted from doing so. 
 Anyone who knows me (knows me properly, I mean, not 'knows me' like the old school people I see in the surgery) will be aware of my hypochondria. It's hilarious. I always jump to the worst possible conclusions as soon as there's a slight change in my health. I don't know why, it must date back to childhood events or something (I may have watched too much Neighbours). There's a line in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar which says 'Cowards die many times before their death; the Valiant taste of death but once.' It may well go on my headstone. I somehow had managed to convince myself that the nurse was going to take one look at my elbows and swiftly say 'Ah. I see you have Dead Man's Elbow,' with no swallow whistle to be heard.
 'What's that mean, Nurse?'
 'Oh, it's nothing to worry about, Mr Pugh. It just means you'll be dead by christmas... if you're lucky.'
 'Right.'
 'Now, please close the door on the way out and don't forget to sign-out on the touch-screen thing in the waiting room. And be careful, it's not as simple as signing-in.'
 'Okay.'
 But, obviously, what actually happened was this:
 'What's wrong with me?' I asked.
 'You've got Housemaid's Knee.'
 'On my elbows?!'
 'Yes. That happens.'
 And she quickly slapped some cream and a bandage on it and sent me packing.  
 Hopefully all will be sorted and back to normal by next week. But if not, I guess I'll have to walk around with my arms stretched in front of me for evermore. It would be annoying but imagine how much more creepy my ghost would be when I die! Like a proper horror movie spectre. 


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Gary and I are going to be on a carnival float tomorrow night. He's going as The Incredible Hulk (!) and I'm going as a Battle of Britain pilot. Gary's going to see U2 the next day so he may have something of a struggle removing all the green paint before the gig. 
 I've been growing a thin, rubbish moustache to complement my uniform since last Friday. It's really embarrassing having to go to the shops and to the pub etc with such a dire thing attached to my face. Gary said that if he had a nose like mine he wouldn't underline it.
 The great Characters From Books camararderie.
 Up until this afternoon I thought I'd just about survived without being subject to too much shame. So, you may ask, what happened this afternoon?
 Let me tell you.
 I left the flat to go and get some milk and was cornered by a reporter from the local BBC News team. 
 'Excuse me, sir, can you tell me whether you are for or against the new Tescos supermarket?'
 And I did just that, forgetting about the moustache. 
 Worse than that, I am one of the few people who seem to be in favour of Tescos, which, and you'll have to take my word for this, in this sleepy upper-middle class town is tantamount to being a Holocaust denier. 
 I'm just hoping they choose not to air my mumbled comments for fear I become barred from Budgens and the Co-Op.  
 If they do air, I may have to lie low for a while. That's after I spend the bulk of tomorrow evening waving at huge crowds of people from a float in one the country's biggest carnival processions, of course.
 Gulp.



 Ryan



p.s. I've used the blog title 'Farewell to Arms' before, but it just seemed so apt this time.