Bill died a two weeks later. He died bravely. The nursing staff told me he had undergone a lot of unnecessary pain rather than call them before the pain got out of hand. He didn't want to make a nuisance of himself. The nurses loved him and some cried when he died. Two days before [...]
Every day Bill would see a doctor. I don't think he saw the same doctor twice. I don't even think he saw the same nurse twice. He would tell his story, they would take notes and say we will do X-rays and ultrasounds (they never did). And he would ask yet again to be transferred [...]
I just read an article about a woman trapped in a public hospital trying to transfer to a private hospital for which she had full cover. I decided to write about Bill's experience shortly before he died. Before I do I should remind you that Nurse Ratched is Jack Nicholson's nemesis in "One Flew Over [...]
Kevin and the Golfing Surprise. On the Sunday of the weekend we stayed at the Grand Hotel in Mt. Victoria some of us decided to have a round of golf at the Leura Golf Club and a round of drinks afterwards at the nineteenth watering hole, the Fairmont Hotel. The maggies were stealing the white [...]
Kind of a Fawlty Towers weekend, but also tragic. I have a very dear friend Kevin. We met when I was 27 and he was 17 - at the old convict gaol, East Sydney Technical College - studying Day Matriculation for the Leaving Certificate in 1964. He went on to study Law at Sydney University [...]