By Big M

Geoffrey found his first week in obstetrics to be quite delightful. Obviously management had seen his potential and arranged for the Midwifery Educator, Candida Albercans, to spend an entire week with him. It had only taken him two days to master the application of a cloth nappy. He’d only stuck the pin through his left index finger four times, and had once mistaken the gender of one little girl, as he’d assumed that the cord was a giant penis. He soon learnt that the big plastic clip was a dead give away!

Geoffrey spent the morning of his third day bathing babies, and had managed to do this without dropping a single one. At morning tea time, Candida told him to return the three infants to their mothers, who were still bed bound for various reasons, then go to tea. Geoffrey did so quickly, and then went off to the cafeteria. He poured some thick, acrid coffee, from the machine, and looked around for a seat. A group of nurses from his old ward occupied one table, amongst them, the most alluring Melena Stuhl. His heart skipped a beat. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. His reverie was interrupted by the scraping of metal chairs on vinyl flooring, almost in unison. The group of nurses all arose in one accord and left the room, all muttering something about a busy ward, as they pushed passed him.

Geoffrey now had a table all to himself. Just as he sat down, Sister Kent sat down next to him, wrinkling her nose at the stench, which must have been considerable, given that years of smoking had rendered her almost anosmic. “How’s obstets, Geoffrey? Haven’t dropped a kiddy yet, have we?”  He cut quite a figure; she thought, uncombed hair, unshaven, wearing ‘scrubs’ that had clearly been hung up on the bedroom floor.

“Oh, no, as if?” Geoffrey laughed, as he massaged his swollen left index finger. “I’ve already bathed three babies this morning.” He replied, with a hint of pride in his voice.

“So you’ve bathed three kiddies in three and a half hours?” Uva raised her left eyebrow. “You’re as indolent as you are ignorant.”

Geoffrey took this as a great compliment. His father, who he only saw at Christmas and Easter, had once said that Geoffrey’s ignorance knew no bounds and the sooner he got a job with the council, the better the whole family would be. Well, Geoffrey had shown him. Been to uni and everything, he thought to himself.

Sister Kent stood up, and patted her pockets for a box of matches to light the Camel that was sitting in the corner of her mouth, the tell tale rattle from her left thigh signalling the whereabouts of the errant matches. It was now against the law to smoke in hospital, but this didn’t stop her from being ready to smoke. “Well son, I can see a long and tortuous career ahead of you.” She mumbled as she wandered through to the garden to light up.

Geoffrey quickly finished his coffee, eager to get back to bath some more babies. At the nurses station the Nursing Unit Manager and Candida greeted him. “Geoffrey, when we bathed the babies this morning, I did make a point of telling you to keep the armbands on, so that you could take the baby back to its mother. Is this correct?”

“Well, yes, I know you said that, but the armbands weren’t aesthetically pleasing, so I took them off.” Geoffrey thought himself very clever, using words like ‘aesthetically’.

“Aesthetics aside, the armband allows the midwife to correctly identify the baby, and prevent mix-ups. Parents do seem to have a desire to take home the infant they conceived!”  Roared Mrs Dalrymple, the broken capillaries on her nose glowed red. “Fortunately it was easy to place the Chinese baby with the Chinese mother, Indian baby with Indian mother, and so on. In future, KEEP THE BLOODY ARMBANDS ON THE BABIES!” Mrs Dalrymple turned on her heel, marched into her office, and slammed the door.

Candida sat Geoffrey down in one of the offices with a couple of obstetric text books with instructions to learn all he could about labour and delivery whilst she went to do some ‘administrative’ tasks. Geoffrey was keen to learn all he could about vaginas, as he’d never managed to see one in a social context. Unfortunately the texts only had pictures of vaginas during delivery, so the mental image that he was constructing wasn’t entirely accurate, or appealing.

Candida returned just after lunch, looking a little flushed, and smelling of Brut 33. “Ah…oh…Geoffrey.” She stammered. “It might be a good time to get you back into the clinical. I’ll get Simon to spend some time with you this afternoon.”

Simon was a flamboyant, outgoing male nurse who had been moved from the surgical ward because of certain ‘misunderstandings’ with some of the male patients. “Ah, Geoffrey, I’m really pleased to meet you. Where have you worked? You must know Andrew, from South Wing, he’s a honey. Funny place here, all tits and fannies. I suppose you’re like me, getting ready for Madi Gras? It’s the place to go to get laid!”

“Get laid.” Thought Geoffrey, his second New Years resolution may also come to fruition. “Can you get laid at this Madi Gras?”

“Darling, everyone gets laid at Madi Gras” Simon laughed. “So, you coming?” Geoffrey nodded enthusiastically. “We’ll have to get you a costume, and a back, crack, ‘n’ sac wax. Don’t worry, we’ve got a month to sort you out, darling.”

Their conversation was interrupted by the sound of a buzzer. “Back to the tits and fannies, darling.”

Meanwhile, Dr James was straightening his polyester tie, and checking that he didn’t have lipstick on his face or collar. These daytime trysts were invigorating. His thoughts quickly turned to his pet project, Geoffrey, who reminded him of a much younger, Dr James. Clearly Geoffrey was management material and should be fast tracked into a health care management job. No sense leaving him languishing in the trenches.

James hurried back to the Executive Suite, where he was greeted with the unmistakable stench of stale urine. He’d gone into admin to get away from this sort of thing. He tracked down the offending chair and pushed into the corridor. Acacia was no-where to be seen. Probably nursing a broken nail. He had a busy afternoon ahead of him. He had to decide on which beds to close to save money. This always had to be balanced against the inevitable ‘bed-block’ in the Emergency Department. “Ha.” He thought. “I could create an Emergency Department overflow ward in one of the empty wards, which had been closed to save money.” He could staff it with casual staff from an agency, which only cost about thirty percent more than permanent staff. All that was needed was a clever sounding acronym.

Planned Emergency Nursing …P.E.N.

Planned Emergency Nursing Scheme…P.E.N.S.

Planned Emergency Nursing Inpatient Scheme…P.E.N.I.S. Perfect!