Posts
Readers of this blog will be starting to realise that air travel is a part of my life that I have mixed feelings about (as in sometimes, I only despise it!), but there does seem to be a trend emerging that every time I get onto an aircraft, events or circumstances conspire to ensure that, as we say in the Consultancy business, "outcomes are compromised to the point of sub-optimisation" (NB Consultant's maxim "Never use one word when ten will do"). On this occasion, the problem is deafness.
Now I have always gone a little bit deaf on aeroplanes (everyone does don't they?) but on this occasion, the effect has been spectacular. We had barely left the runway at Schipol (I don't do Heathrow - but that will be a topic for another day) when there was a pop in my right ear and, that was that. Silence, silencio, rien de sound - aural nowt! Usually this reverses on landing so I was not too distressed. (This will actually soon become a boon since some airlines are piloting a (daft) scheme to allow people to use their mobiles in flight. Can you imagine? Manchester to Kuala Lumpur, 13 hours of being welded into an over large baked bean tin with wings, strapped into a seat next to some prat yelling "Yeah I'm on the plane, just going past Bangalore" - Oh god!) However, on this occasion it did not reverse. Going through customs I had to cock my head at a ludicrous angle like some kind of demented parrot, just to hear the customs official ask me if I was a drug-trafficking human slaver or not.
That was on Sunday, on Monday I was due to give my presentation and could not actually tell whether I was whispering or yelling like a TV evangelist (or worse still Donald Trump - have you seen the US version of the Apprentice? If not, you have no idea just how GOOD Alan Sugar, sorry "Sralan", actually is). Luckily, as this was a health care conference and one of the delegates was a client, help was at hand. A lovely lady, she manages one of the hospitals in town and speedily referred me to an ENT specialist. This was great and involved her in putting herself and her staff out for me quite considerably. I am very grateful to them all for their efforts but it did start a rather frantic race against the clock which one's blood pressure has still to normalise from, and resulted in me shouting at some strangers in Starbucks!
I raced to the hospital, leaving the convention centre at 2 in the afternoon (due to present at 5, so no pressure!). The ENT surgeon saw me really quickly but said he would have to make incisions in my eardrums (not as nice as it sounds!) but that, since this was a private facility, he would give me a local anaesthetic first which would take one hour to work. In the meantime, the anaesthetic would make me A LITTLE MORE DEAF and that I could go downstairs to the Starbucks and have a coffee while we waited.
This I did but on getting to Starbucks I was now so deaf I could not even hear my own footfall. I ordered a Cappacino, by which I mean I TRIED to order a cappacino. It was obvious from the body language of the "Barista" that I was not speaking too loudly (he was virtually bent double over the counter trying to hear me). As I am a world-renowned expert in non-verbal communications, I was quickly able to deduce that I needed to speak up a little bit and so I made a slight and subtle adjustment. He recoiled as if shot...everyone did. I looked behind me, it was carnage! Someone had dropped a tray on the floor, small children were crying and hiding behind their mother's skirts - it is just possible that I had over-adjusted just a tad on the volume front! I was asked to leave. Never actually been barred from a coffee house before so that is another first for the personal CV.
Finally went back to the doc and had the procedure then rushed back to the convention centre with 5 minutes to spare. Presentation was a bit of a blur but I think the audience didn't notice the pale pink liquid that gently seeped from the presenters' ears every time he looked up from the lectern.
I wonder if they'll ask me back next year?
