Still Doing Time

I thought I'd be out by now, honest I did, Guv, what with time off for good behaviour and being such a bouncy (relatively speaking) patient who was back on her feet and doing laps up and down the hospital corridors the day after last week's operation (I've devised my own track around the bank of lifts and a circuit that involves some pretty fancy configurations. Unfortunately, I frequently surprise or frighten the staff as I come "whizzing" around a corner, my purple dressing gown-cape flying), but alas, here I am a week later still in the medical slammer because of hardware-software interface issues. Basically, I can't leave until a tiny piece of tubing has been yanked out and it HAS to stay in for seven days. Hopefully, they'll jump the gun a little and it'll come out tomorrow. Cross fingers.

But I haven't wasted my time. After a quick, high-priority, post op system check to make sure my brain was still working the way it should (thinking up stories) I've squeezed in some writing in between the countless check ups, taking drugs and all the medical messing around. I've also listened to audio books as I've walked my 3 x 20 minute carpeted laps (what a disciplined athlete I am), have read books, chatted with visitors, nurses and ancillary staff, and, of course, have caught up with really important matters that I was seriously behind on like Kim K's drama-filled pregnancy, Kanye's caddishness, Kate's bump, Justin B's love life, Miley's postponed wedding, Chaz B's weight problems, and Jessica S's topsy-turvy whatever. I'm not entirely sure about Jen's situation. In one magazine she is happy and possibly pregnant, while in another she is apparently hiding some secret that the media feel honour-bound to uncover so they can splash it across a double page feature sometime in the near future. I can hardly wait for the reveal. No, wait, maybe I can. Yes, definitely and officially, I don't care. I can tell it's been zonks since I've seriously read these picture-filled mags rather than just flicked through them at checkouts, because I had to do a bit of research on the ubiquitous terms babydaddy and babymama so as to understand the subtle cues about marital status that I correctly suspected they incorporated.

They're fun enough to read, and enlightening in a social studies kind of way, but after a few such fascinating articles, I usually seize Scientific American or the like to rev up my brain again. Everything in moderation.

Anyway, the hospital is winding down for the night and all good patients are heading for their beds. I shall do so with a book.

Reading in bed - what a luxury.

Usually.

But I'd much rather be doing it at home.