June 04, 2004
i’m not sure exactly what she thinks i’ll be doing in europe, and i didn’t really want to disappoint her
Today I went to the doctor on Sydney road. I usually go to the uni doctor, pretend like I’m still going to unimelb so I can see the excellent doctors there. But when I’m too sick (or lazy) to ride the 20mins to Carlton, or ride the annoying tram 15mins then walk 20 slow minutes across to the clinic, I go to the medical centre on Sydney road. It’s where I go when I want antibiotics and a complete lack of patient-doctor rapport. I’d never go there for anything important, like a pap smear, or an ongoing problem. I go there when I want a Quick Fix. And I know this cold. It needs to be Fixed, or I’ll be sick forever. Just like last time. I’ve been sick since last Thursday – that’s a week of sickness. I’m finally riding my bike again (though, as I learnt today, it’s a slow, coughing-my-guts up and arriving really exhausted sort of riding), but I’m not properly well yet. My voice is weird, I’m coughing and snorting up discoloured goobs, I’m run down, etc etc etc.
So I went to the doctor. I don’t want to fly with buggered Eustachian tubes. Pain really isn’t my thing.
I saw a nice Indian lady doctor (rather than the somewhat disturbingly overweight middle-aged man doctor), for oh, about 10 quality minutes. I’m usually all about booking double appointments with doctors so I can actually get some useful communication going – I don’t really feel that 10 minutes is sufficient time for a discussion about, oh, contraceptives, say. It took the doc, what, five years of study to figure out contraceptives. I think I’ll need more than 10 minutes.
But because I was at the clinic, I was prepared to spend 10 minutes. It was a nice 10 minutes. We talked mostly about that Moulin Rouge program that’s on the ABC at the moment. It's about these Australian dancer girls who go to France to dance in some can can show (the actual Moulin Rouge may be involved, but I’m not sure). I think we talked about that show because I said I needed to be well to go dance in Europe. I’m not sure exactly what she thinks I’ll be doing in Europe, and I didn’t really want to disappoint her. Though that quick look up the back of my shirt while she plied her stethoscope should have cued her in on my actual status as a Dancer. Maybe she though I was sporting some fashionably European curves for the new season. Or maybe she wasn’t really paying attention when she watched the naked dancing episode.
We did, though, spend a fair few minutes discussing the naked episode. I was assured that it wasn’t just nakedness. It was well, you know, dancing nakedness. I assured her in return, that I understood. We talked very much in subtexts.
Seems the doc (who’s name I don’t know) is mighty keen on the Moulin Rouge show, that she works long, hard days on Tuesdays (hence the program’s appeal) and was interested in the ethical dilemma posed for the girls by the naked episode. And by their living conditions in Europe.
Well, I guess it was far more interesting than the content of my lungs.
I will have to go see the inestimable Dr Flowers to discuss this ongoing cold situation, though. Wonder what she’s been watching lately…
