I had the misfortune of having to go into hospital for a dental operation when I was a teenager, total anaesthetic, the works. It came as some surprise to me that I had wonky teeth, because they all worked perfectly well, but it appeared that I had one that insisted on growing sideways, and given enough rope would have had me looking like Shane McGowan within a matter of months. Rubbing his hands with glee, the dental surgeon revealed plans to rip my gob open, pull out teeth and transplant the offending molar in the gap, all held together with a (and I quote) "small splint" and the lastest medical advances in superglue.
Naturally, this would also involve a certain amount of brace-wearing, which, as any fourteen year old might testify, is guaranteed to make you look and sound like some sort of belming idiot at exactly the same time you are trying to make yourself desirable to the opposite sex. The only girl who would even look at me had more metal in her mouth than Jaws from the James Bond films.
So, carted I was, off to the Royal Berkshire Hospital and injected with an armful of unnecessarily painful drugs until I passed out.
When I eventually came round, feeling worse than shit, the first thing I noticed was that my mouth was a different shape. There was something in there. Something big and unnatural. In fact, closer inspection revealed that someone had superglued a boxer's gumshield inside my mouth by way of a practical joke. This would be the "small splint", the dentist had told me about, the lying bastard. It was fucking massive, and as my mother came into focus at the side of her bed, I told her so.
"I uhi ahiv."
"Pardon?"
"E hin. I uhi ahiv."
Ah. The English language was going to take some work. If I was going to try to communicate with people, I thought it best to tell them something important. Like the fact I was dying to go to the toilet. Despite a Nil-by-Mouth diet, I was utterly bursting for a piss.
"I urin or a iss"
"Pardon?"
"Oilet!"
I think I might have resorted to a mime at this stage, but I finally got the message across, and rather unwisely heaved myself out of my bed onto wobbling legs, and staggered uncertainly towards the double doors at the end of the ward and the toilets that lay beyond.
If only I had realized I was still wearing my surgical gown. The type of surgical gown which does up at the back, with nothing worn underneath.
Result: walking through a mixed day ward, arse hanging out, to shrieks of disgust of the other patients.
I got as far as the door before the effects of the anaesthetic caught me, and I bowked up all the blood I'd swallowed during the operation, all over some bloke's bed and down my front, in a rather spectacular style reminiscent of a John Carpenter movie.
"Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaarch!"
"Nurse!" screamed the poor, blood-spattered unfortunate.
"Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaarch!" I contined.
"Nurse! The blood! The blood!"
"Urrrr!" I agreed, sounding, and looking, like the Creature From The Pit.
Some nurse, all tight dress and cleavage appeared and tried to usher me back to my bed. Unfortunately, the was bloody puke everywhere, and her sensible flat shoes were no match for it as she slipped and landed flat on her back in a dreadful red mixture of the contents of my stomach. I think I made her cry, in fact.
Coming to her rescue, a gallant porter managed to guide me back to my bed, and all he got in return were my sloppy seconds.
"Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaarch!"
I think I might have let a small amount of wee out as well.
Come to think of it, it was, in fact, rather a lot of wee.
"Urrrr!", and finally getting used to the big lump of plastic in my mouth: "Uckin' ell."
Across the ward came the enraged voice of an elderly visitor:
"It's disgusting, that's what it is. You can see his arse an' everything. You! Young man! Turn round! see? You can see his arse!"
It was like The Exorcist.
I fucking hate hospitals.
Also: More of this crap at Duck News.
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