I work at the enquiries desk at a hospital. Most of the major banks in Australia no longer charge withdrawal fees for using a different bank’s ATM. However, a lot of people don’t realise this or prefer to use their own bank’s ATM.

Visitor: “Do you have an ATM in here?”

Me: “Yes, we have two, [Bank #1] or [Bank #2]. Which would you prefer?”

Visitor: “[Bank #3].”

Me: “That was not an option, sir; we’ve got [Bank #1] or [Bank #2].”

The visitor just stares at me blankly.

Me: “Okaaaay, then.”

I give them directions to the closest one.

I work at the enquiries desk of a hospital.

Visitor: “Do you have any maps?”

Me: “We sure do!”

I hand him a pocket-sized fold-out map with a picture and the name of our hospital in bold writing across the front.

Visitor: “Is this a map of the hospital?”

Me: *Unable to hide my smile* “What else would it be a map of?”

The visitor catches on to how silly a question that was and laughs at himself.

Visitor: “I don’t know, maybe London?”

Since my grandma died, my eighty-nine-year-old grandad has stubbornly decided to live on his own. He is still quite able and independent, so the family respects this, but I am often on-call to deal with anything he needs help with, including medical appointments.

One Friday evening, I get a call from my mother who lives five hours away.

Mum: “You need to meet [Grandad] at the hospital!”

Me: “Oh, no! What happened?!”

Mum: “He found blood in his stool and he’s going to get checked out. I told him to wait for you but you know what he’s like. Please meet him there and wait with him.”

I head out without delay and meet him there. The doctor is very quick and schedules the tests. I wait with him throughout the night; sadly, the place is very busy, and we have to wait until midnight. He gets called in for the test, and we are told to wait for a phone call on Monday.

We head home, and as my grandad settles in, I do what I usually do when I visit him and check his fridge and cupboards to assess his food supply. My grandma was the cook, and since her passing, my grandad only really cooks ready-meals, which he enjoys, so everyone is fine. I open the fridge and spot something I can’t ignore.

Me: “Grandad, why are there ten packs of chopped beetroot in the fridge?”

Grandad: *Quite proudly* “They were on sale as they’re going off soon! I bought all of them!”

Me: “Have you been eating all of these? For how long? There is a lot here!”

Grandad: “I couldn’t be bothered to cook the other day, so I just had a big bowl of the beetroot while I watched the telly.”

Me: *Bridging my nose* “Grandad, do you think the ‘blood’ you saw in your stool might have been the ridiculous amount of beetroot you’ve been eating for the last few days?”

My grandad sits there for a moment until he realises what I have implied.

Grandad: “Now that I think about it…”

On Monday morning, the hospital calls and confirms my hypothesis when I tell them. Their response?

Hospital: “At least he’s getting his antioxidants!”

Back in the 1960s, when I am a young man of seventeen going on eighteen, I work in the medical laboratory of the local teaching hospital. One of my regular jobs is to go round the wards collecting blood samples for pre-op testing.

I am in the day-room of the gynaecological ward collecting blood from twenty to thirty ladies. One of the younger ones is very obviously extremely nervous. One of the older ladies speaks up.

Older Lady: “Don’t worry about him, love; it’s only a little prick.”

I blushed the colour of a beetroot and suddenly everyone, except me, was much more relaxed.

Some months ago, I was in hospital for, among other issues, a stroke which temporarily affected my speech. As I could still grunt, “Ta,” and I was encouraged to be as active as possible, I dressed in my ordinary casual clothes every morning and went to the newsagents located just inside the hospital’s main building to buy newspapers and odds and ends for myself and some of the other patients in the same ward who were immobile.

I normally paid by credit card. One morning, the card reader spent a long time thinking about it after I entered my PIN and then returned the error message, “Transaction timed out.” This was an unusual but not disastrous condition. It might have meant that the hospital’s Wi-Fi or telephone system was temporarily overloaded or having problems, or an intervening IP server might have been hiccuping, or the card issuer’s hardware or software might have been the problem. It did not mean that the PIN was entered incorrectly or that the card had expired or had been reported lost or stolen.

Nevertheless, the cashier said rather brusquely:

Cashier: “This card is bad!”

Then, the cashier pulled the card out of the reader and began trying to tear it in two.

Being unable to articulate any coherent protest, I snatched the card back and disappeared through the door to the wards as rapidly as possible, before the cashier could protest or call hospital security.

I went back to the newsagents later that day, intending to speak as best I could to the manager, but it was unnecessary as the cashier was no longer present. My card had been left with a kink, so card readers spat it back out on half the subsequent occasions I tried to use it until I was discharged (articulate, and even loquacious) and could order a replacement.

I did later write to the newsagents’ chain’s head office, as the cashier obviously needed IT training, if not a lesson in manners. It was not uncommon to see patients wandering about that particular branch in hospital pyjamas or gowns, partially stupefied by infirmity or medication, and who would have had even less chance than I had of preventing their credit cards being unfairly retained or even destroyed.