Herself is a lovely person.

She is kind, generous, caring, intelligent and has a wicked sense of humour.

Underneath that soft gentle exterior though there is a core of weapons grade Plutonium which is never far from critical mass.

Having lived together for the best part of forty five years, I am well used to this. I have learned which times I can pre-empt detonation with some defusing and when to run for cover before the nuclear blast hits. I have the scars to prove it.

She doesn’t like hospitals. It’s a general thing and applies to all establishments even if they are top of the range luxurious places. The place they brought her during the week was a public hospital which tends to be somewhat utilitarian. It’s the same place I was dumped in after last years heart “incident” so I know what it’s like.

I guessed when she was carted off that she would be hovering at Red Alert and not very happy. When in that state, people around her should be wary. Hospital staff tend not to be very wary so I expected a detonation. Sure enough, after one day they had had enough in her ward and shifted her off to another. This made life tricky for me as phoning the place is a nightmare and I had only just managed to wheedle out of the nurse the direct number to the ward.

I phoned the next day and got on to a nurse who sounded like she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. I sympathised. She told me that Herself had been moved to another ward, presumably to preserve the sanity of the staff.

The next day the same thing happened. They had shifted her yet again. Staff in there obviously lack my thick skin. I began to wonder how many wards there were. After all, there is a bit of a panic over this virus lark and half the wards there are a no-go area. So what were they going to do with Herself when they ran out of wards?

I discovered yesterday. They had had enough. They had thrown her out and had sent her over to another hospital.

Normally I phone the hospitals from home but I was out yesterday evening. It was Grandson the Younger’s birthday and I was invited for dinner. Fuck the restrictions – some things are more important. But while I was there I thought I had better check on Herself’s progress. Because I was using my mobile phone, I had a record of the number of times I had to phone any particular number. So I know I phoned the main hospital four times before eventually begging the ward number. I then had to ring the ward ten times before getting through.

The nurse I spoke to was very me and assured me that Herself was in fine form. Strangely that’s the term I use when Herself is about to detonate. I asked if the nurse had any idea when Herself might be coming home.

“I don’t know” said the nurse and she burst into tears.