122. A Close one

122.  A close one

The story of which I am about to relate concerning Shiplake is true.

Two years ago the Captain’s son Young Lochinvar aka The Roger aka Adam got married in the Chapel at Shiplake College overlooking the Thames .The ceremony took place at just gone noon and afterwards the wedding party  had drinks in the beautifully lawned gardens of this picturesque venue.

The Captain being a plain man, drank very plain drinks that afternoon albeit his favourite Timothy Taylors landlord. Early in the evening, he and his wife sat down in a quiet corner to contemplate the proceedings of the day. Soaking up the rays on what had been a perfect day, the Captain suddenly spat out a mouthful of his favourite brew .A wasp had crawled its way into his drink and on supping his ale was promptly stunk five times inside his mouth and within the same number of minutes half of his face suddenly expanded its size to over twice its normal size. His tongue was swollen and he now spoke with a heavy, slurred out of sync lisp. He looked like the elephant man but a damn site more handsome.

The captain was rushed into the Emergency and Accident unit at the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading. In less than two minutes, the nurses had shaved his arm plugged in two drip lines one containing adrenalin and the other some type of steroid. While the captain was in a semi-stupor, an oxygen mask was fitted. Several times during the next 30 minutes the alarm went off indicating a problem and the Captain thought he heard the nurse say “I hope he’s going to make it “. Unknown to the Captain, about 1 % of people who go into anaphylactic shock die.

Anyway after a couple of hours the Captain’s condition had stabilized and  he was allowed to go home .However all was not well since the Captain could not find his expensive and sentimental wrist watch. The Captain’s wrath was spent on the desk nurse and declared that “I came in here, almost died and got fuckin’ robbed and I want the police to be informed”.

The desk nurse told the Captain that the duty night nurse had gone home and she was sure that it would turn up.”Like a needle in a haystack” the Captain retorted.

Arriving home somewhat  weary , the Captain stripped off and there the watch was strapped to the other wrist…apparently they had had to shave the Captain’s arm to administer the live saving drips and had for security reasons had strapped his watch to his other arm. Of course the Captain made the phone call somewhat sheepishly to the desk nurse and ate a huge portion of humble pie accompanied by several Paracetamol.