The Archive

Dramarama

It was all very exciting after work today.

As I left the office, I heard a loud BANG (is there such a thing as a quiet bang? I don't think so. A quiet bang just isn't a bang at all, surely. It's a clunk at best).

I looked up to see a young chap sail through the air and clonk down onto the pavement, closely followed by what was left of his scooter.

'Crikey' thought I, 'that looks nasty. I wish I had my camera'.

Sadly, without the wherewithal to make a photojournalism fortune out of being in the right place at the right time, I had to help out.

I went over, checked the guy out (not much blood, nothing in the way of horribly distorted limbs, looks basically intact, if very pale) and told him everything was going to be fine.

I know, what you're thinking. I'm not a doctor, nor have I even played one on TV. How do I know if everything is going to be fine?

I don't, but I figured 'fucking hell, that looks nasty mate, do you reckon you could get by with just one leg?' was not what he needed to hear right then.

Anyway, by this time, further rubberneckers had arrived, so I took off my coat and handed it to one so he could keep the guy warm and told another to keep talking to him whilst I phoned for an ambulance.

Now 2 surprising things happened...

1. "Hello, this is the London ambulance service. We are experiencing a heavy volume of calls at present and your are being held in a queue."

What?!

Fucking hell. All my life I've been raised with the idea of 999 as this amazing, near-sacred thing which, when all else fails you can dial confident that help is a mere moment away. So as you can imagine, being put on hold was something of a disappointment.

Then 2. After I'd finally got through, I looked up to see the bloke I'd handed my coat to still holding it.

Jesus, I know I had only handed him the coat and vaguely waved in the direction of the prone and broken figure on the floor, but you'd think he'd be able to figure it out wouldn't you?

What did he think I meant? "Excuse me mate, I know it's minus two degrees, but I get really hot whilst making phone calls, so I wonder if you could hold this for me for a moment?"

Fortunately, more sign language got the message across and the coat was put on the kid, leaving me free to wait even more for the ambulance service until I gave them all the details over the phone.

Then all we had to do was wait for the ambulance. Now I'm not going to moan that they took 15 minutes to arrive as they at least had a record of the call when I phoned to check, and the poor ambulance guys had got diverted to another bike accident on the way (motorcyclists of Britain - try staying upright for goodness' sake).

I did wonder, however, if it was like a pizza, and if they didn't come in 30 minutes, would the treatment be free? Well, I guess it's free anyway. Maybe they should have bought us a pizza instead.

And when it came, they were very good, despite not offering to treat the hypothermia that by that time I was beginning to go down with.

So the kid was fine and it was, all in all, better than being at home watching much the same thing with less convincing dialogue on Casualty.

And finally, when they did put the lad up onto the stretcher, they first had to dig him out of a pile of coats that a number of passers by had all given up to keep him warm whilst we waited.

So there's something to put your faith back in human nature anyway.

posted by Peter The Great @ 9:00 PM