Maybe in the future they’ll have an AI coordinator. Something with a wipe-clean face and a decent range of expressions. Something that can reply to an email, accept a referral, schedule a visit, settle an argument, make a clinical decision, take a note, make an amendment, triage a patient, liaise with a pharmacist, sort out an IT problem and laugh sympathetically at the struggles of a new member of staff – whilst at the same time keeping tabs on the thirty or so patient visits that are happening at any given moment. Until they do, though, they’re stuck with us.

Coordinating makes you crazy. Uncoordinated. Or, if not that, exactly, more hyper-coordinated, so that everything you do, even the little things, are done so intensely and with such purpose, you feel a little shaky by lunchtime – something which all the coffee you drink does nothing to ease.

You’re besieged by nurses and therapists, managers and carers, cleaners and admin staff, a constant coming and going, everyone wanting something, from a shift swap to an update to a pencil sharpener. I’m so conscious of the noise levels I’ve toyed with the idea of wearing a Daft Punk-style helmet – maybe with a light on the top that’ll flash when I’m available. I feel sorry for whoever it is I happen to be speaking to on the phone. They must think I’m calling from a bus station or a call centre. It can’t sound good.

There are some perks, though. Limitless coffee is one. The buzz of getting things in order is another. But one of the best are the random conversations you overhear when people are waiting to handover.

For example:

A: I went on that dating app you told me about.
B: Yeah? How d’you get on?
A: Alright. I struggled a bit with my profile. I thought I sounded a bit boring, so when it said hobbies I put chess.
B: Chess?
A: Yeah. Why?
B: Can you even play chess?
A: No.
B: Aren’t you worried you’ll get found out?
A: We’re hardly likely to be playing chess on our first date, are we? Unless they’re a complete perv.
B: But what if they ask you about it?
A: I’ll just say I like to play it now and again and that’s it.
B: But what if they ask you stuff?
A: Like what?
B: I don’t know. Who your favourite player is.
A: (laughs) They won’t.
(pause)
B: Don’t you think it might put them off?
A: I’ve already had two dates.
B: Two?
A: Two.
(pause)
B: They must be desperate.
A: Thanks a lot.

And another:

A: I was at the doctor’s the other day and there’s this kid with his hoodie up standing in front of me in the queue, shuffling about. And I think to myself – hang on a minute, that’s Tiffany’s youngest, Brandon. So I tap him on the shoulder, and he turns round, and fuck me, it was! So I says to him “What are you doing here, Brandon?” – but then I think – No! Noooo no no! That’s naughty. I can’t be asking him that. I mean, he might go and tell me, and that’d be awkward. For both of us. I mean – I’m best mates with Tiffany and I might struggle not to spill the beans. But do you know what he says? He says “I’m too embarrassed”. So I say “Well you gotta tell me now.” And he goes: “No. You’ll just think I’m a dullard.”
B: A dullard?
A: A dullard. That’s what he says. A dullard. I didn’t even know what it meant. I thought it was a kind of duck.
B: What teenage boy uses a word like dullard?
A: A Brandon-type boy, obviously Shell. Anyway, I say to him: “Whatever it is I won’t think any the worse of you. Promise.” So he says: ‘I’ve got a fingernail stuck in my throat”.
B: A fingernail?
A: He bites his nails and swallows it. And a bit got stuck in his throat.
B: Urgh! Who bites their nails and swallows it? Gack!
A: Yeah? Well – sorry to ruin your world, Shell, but a lot of people do. And not everyone who picks their nose flicks it, neither.