Magic!

Toni, as he mentioned forcibly to the doctor who was speaking to him at the end of his particularly pointless series of rehabilitation exercises on his faulty knee, had been waiting for a magnetic resonance scan for one month and twenty days.  He cut through the vacuous pleasantries of the woman and made the strength of his displeasure obvious.  He was then assured that the hospital would be contacted and that the hospital would contact him either on the same day or the next without fail.  If failure there was then he was to ring the hospital and speak directly to the person involved.

My arrival home (to no new camera!) was taken up with a discussion about Toni’s experiences for the first hour or so and our general dismissal of the managerial approach to expensive resources.  We both agreed that something like a magnetic resonance scanner should be operated virtually 24 hours a day and we would be prepared to go at five o’clock in the morning is that was when the machine was available.

To change our mood and to bring an end to the bitter recriminations about the health of the health service in Spain and the general level of corruption that we felt motivated everyone and everything we went out to a local fast food joint and had some comfort food!

When we were driving home, Toni’s mobile started ringing.  It was the hospital asking if Toni could get to the hospital at once and they had an opportunity to get him done.

We went, but all the way there we speculated on the fact that if this could suddenly be arranged on the day that Toni made a fuss in rehab. perhaps it could have been arranged one month and twenty days ago just as easily!  After all if the machine has a quota of ten patients a day, it is almost certain that at least one of them will cancel on the day itself and another will simply not turn up, thereby giving spaces which someone like Toni would have been eager and available to fill.

Still, the scan has now been done and we should (and are) grateful.  There is now a week’s delay and the scan should be ready to be interpreted and we will have a clearer idea of what exactly is wrong with Toni’s knee.  And that, surely, is the start of real improvement.  I hope.

Meanwhile this interminable week drags its tortuous way along without the bright spot of playing around with a new camera.  I know that I should not have built any hopes on a “three day delivery” as being anything other than a series of connected pixels on a computer screen, but I did and I am bitterly disappointed that I do not have my latest gadget to hand with which to play or experiment as I should say.

We are leading up to the Maths Department Photography Competition which I force my colleagues to enter because we are seeking to stymie the relentless success of one of my senior colleagues who until fairly recently seemed to have a monopoly of staff prizes.  Last year we broke the sequence with a colleague in the English Department walking away with the laurels.  This is something we hope to repeat this year!  My new gadget will be extensively used to find that elusive winner in our “Anyone Other Than X” approach to the competition!

All entries are printed out and exhibited in a small exhibition in the new building of the secondary section of the school.  The winners of each section of the competition are sent to the regional final of the competition for Barcelona so here is the chance of fame and glory awaiting the most proficient.

Having spoken to the maths teacher it appears that the titles of the photographs are more important than the actual picture itself.  Points are obviously awarded for the specious linking of a random picture with some mathematical concept.  I have a long held ambition to produce a photograph to illustrate the solution used to solve quadratic equations but, in spite of repeated request to those who should know, I have been given little help in trying to find a subject that provides a graphic equivalent.  I shall continue to search and, as soon as I get my hand on my new camera, snap!

There continues to be no sense of the Festive Season in school, which makes this endless week seem even longer.  As far as I can tell there is little or no concession to Christmas in the plans for next week apart from the last day of term when chaos will reign supreme and I will rise in all my red splendour as the Scarlet King of Misrule.  Though I think that such an interpretation of the role might go a little way above the heads of the miniscule foetal children who are my target audience.

It will be interesting to compare the reactions of Spanish children with the little kids of British staff who have been my previous victims.   In my experience, no matter how Jolly you appear to be the character is usually enough in itself to provoke floods of tears in some children and their despairing rush to the comforting arms of teachers.  We shall see.