What I do at Work...

I've just realised I've haven't spoken much about my working life. I think you know that I work two days a week in the city...but I haven't said much about that work place, which is a shame, because we have some hilarious things happen.

I work for a large private practice in the city. I've been there on and off since 2001. I say on and off because I was a casual worker for a while and then I was made a member of the permanent staff a couple of years ago.

The doctors, the practice manager, the nurses and secretaries are all lovely people and we get on reasonably well with each other...you always get some personality conflict, but it's not enough to worry about.

We have one doctor who is an absolute sweetie. He's the sort of person we would do anything for but he never takes advantage in that respect...and he has the funniest sense of humour, with a laugh that makes everyone else laugh. His patients love him and so do the staff.

One day, he came in to our office and was telling us about some do he had gone to in the weekend where he had to wear a kilt. He asked one of the pipers what was actually worn under the kilt and got the answer, "Nothing, mate."

Of course, I opened my mouth and said "Oh, that's called going commando". B gave his distinctive chuckle and as he walked back out into the waiting room said, "Yep, going commando...ready for action!" Helen and I roared laughing, but afterwards wondered what the patients must have thought.

The office that Helen and I share has the most wonderful 180 degree view towards the western suburbs and the doctors often come in and gaze at the view and chat to us. The same doctor I told you about above, B, was born out west and spent his childhood and teens in the bush. He has taught us how to recognise by the clouds if it's going to rain. You see, if the clouds have flat bottoms, there's no rain in them.

So, one day last week, B wanders in and gazes out the window with the comment, "The clouds all have flat bottoms, girls, no rain there." (Isn't it lovely, we're in our 60s and he calls us girls). Helen and I had our head phones on and didn't hear properly, we both stopped and said, "What did you say?"

B laughed his distinctive laugh and said "Flat bottoms, girls...not fat bottoms. Although the girls in admin all have lovely perky bottoms!" We just about fell off our chairs laughing...we're part of the admin team and I for one, haven't got a lovely perky bottom...although I used to, when I was about five.

Then, A, whom I do a lot of work for, has the driest sense of humour. He's such a lovely fellow and his patients love him, too. One day, one of the secretaries, Jenny, and I were at the lunch table talking about snakes. I was telling her about the brown snake that Oscar chased and Jenny told me about one she thought was a stick on the path until it wriggled away. So, we're chatting away like this while A was making himself a cup of coffee and listening, but not saying anything.

Suddenly, this quiet voice from A says, "What about a one-eyed trouser snake?" Jenny and I cracked up laughing, then A points at me and accused me of setting him up...which made us laugh even more.

I often wonder what the patients must think to hear great guffaws of laughter coming from the lunch room...oh well, at least they know we're happy.

As I mentioned earlier, we have a lovely view from our office out to the western suburbs, but closer, like across the road, are high rise apartments. One day, Helen suddenly yelled, "Oh my God, I've just seen a naked man!" Of course, I stopped work and peered over at the apartment in question and sure enough, this guy was naked (unfortunately, he wasn't young and toned but bald and flabby). Obviously, he felt the balcony wall was high enough to hide his boy bits. Ahah, our office was slightly higher and we had a great view.

I was telling P, another doctor, who is always giving us heaps for having the best view in the whole practice, about our naked gent. He was laughing and suggested we get a laser pointer to aim at him...as P said, "It would make him think."

Reading through all this, you may get the impression that we spend all our time laughing and joking with the doctors and looking out the window...you'd probably be right. However, we do get a lot of work down, so I guess we're entitled to some levity now and then.

It's not all laughs, in my working life I have made some major mistakes that everyone remembers...but that's another story.