11:55 am. Rugby Central Surgery. The doctor indeed diagnoses an infection so more antibiotics. I see the same doctor who sent me for the initial tests – she may have saved my life! I get the prescription filled and hope for the best.

I pop into work and with Lesley’s help I deposit my struggling laptop and retrieve the desktop machine for work at home. The car journey is welcome.

Back home and some post has arrived while we were out. Oh No!!!! My next scan was scheduled for THIS MORNING!! Royal Mail took 5 DAYS to deliver the letter. So much for the efficiency of the private sector!  I start calling the contacts I have at the hospital.  I eventually speak to my consultant’s secretary and she promises to sort things out. I can only wait.

Dejectedly I set up the desktop and configure it to let me access work files remotely. Things appear to be getting better until I come to access a vital piece of software and find that the suppliers have screwed up the licence. I am locked out. I send them an abrupt email. That’s it, I’ve had enough.

I start my antibiotics but am fully aware that it will be at least a day before they start to take effect.

In the evening I recall Trade Secretary Dr Liam Fox on the TV last night extolling the virtue of free trade and the opportunities that gives for improvement in public services. I feel an urgent need to take his Doctorate certificate (whatever slot machine he clearly purchased it from) and ram it so far up his arse that he feels the same physical pain I feel at this moment. If I am wrong and he really is a Doctor he should be able to extract it and heal himself. There, a little test for him!

I reread the last paragraph and see the bitterness resulting from the pain. I consider whether to take it out.  But I have determined to put in thoughts as they arise so in it stays. It is me.