Glasgow Royal cheers

It's snowing, inconveniently, but I'm not going to mention it again. Instead, I'm going to indulge in a wee paean of praise for the Plastic Surgery department at Glasgow Royal Infirmary - and no, I wasn't having cosmetic surgery. Just in case you ask. It was a very tiny bit of cutting and stitching that was required, though I suppose the resulting biopsy may lead to a further visit.

The great thing is that I'm not anything like as bothered by that thought as I was. The people I met there - especially Jim the nurse - couldn't have been better at mixing professionalism with the appearance of personal interest; the building was newish and therefore cheering; the atmosphere in theatre was calm and unthreatening. My face, having had any vestiges of moisturiser swabbed off it, was swathed in drapes, so I couldn't see anyone, but I was able to listen to the instructions as someone practised tiny stitches on my temple (I never thought of the bit in front of my ear as the temple, but there you are) and join in the discussion about how difficult it was to explain the difference between a granny knot and a reef knot. (To be honest, I think the instructing surgeon was better at surgery than language - it was my idea to call it a granny knot when one stitch had to be removed and redone)

Even the horrid sensation of the local anaesthetic was alleviated by the cheerful warning that it would be like a dental injection but wouldn't last, and by the discussion of the relative merits of the words "prick" and "scratch" in describing the sensation of an injection - apparently they worry about people's reactions to the former - and by the realisation that it worked so well. I was grateful for the fact that I was seen almost as soon as I got there (early: we were anxious about the black ice on the pavements and our ignorance of the hospital layout) and that it was still light when we finally escaped ...

...to some lovely tea and a large chunk of carrot-cake in nearby Brewhaha. Very therapeutic - I recommend it. But let's hear it for the NHS - at least in Glasgow Royal.