Optical mutterings

Today I have been having my eyes tested. This is not an excersise I enjoy, although I am allowed out of my padded cell and my straightjacket so I suppose I should look on the bright side.

The problem with opticians is that it's all about the eyes and that makes me queasy. They're just so gooey.

At school we had a Biology lesson.. no not that one... I went to an all boys Secondary Modern, consequently page 156 was missing from all biology books, so the teachers didn't bother with it. Our sex education consisted of buying pictures off Pete whose Dad had a paper recycling business and got all the unsold porno mags to pulp and recycle. Porno Pete "liberated" a few before they went onto the pulper, cut out the pics and sold them to us for our dinner money. Unsurprisingly he was the first kid at our school to get his own Music Centre and the fattest, ah... the fruits of unprincipled capitalism!

Instead of sex education, we spent extra time enjoying the doubtful pleasures of dissecting frogs, examining cowpats and microwaving wasps, well ok the wasp microwaving wasn't part of lessons.

One amongst many of the repugnant elements of our biology lesson was about the eyes, so the teacher brought in a few dozen bullseyes and said...

Teach: Boys, today we are going to learn about the eye, get out your knives (we all carried knives at school, it was part of the kit) and find me the aqueas humour, vitreous humour, the lens and the retina.

Well of course smelly Terry was at it like it was his dinner, in went his knife and the eye exploded... goo everywhere... seems it wasn't that fresh. Other boys, taking note, gingerly made their first incision, with varying results. Most of the eyes ended up skidding across the tables and onto the floor, but I just couldn't... I mean... yuk!!!

Teach: (to me) Boy...what are you doing boy..? Get on with it..
Me: I can't sir...
Teach: Of course you can boy..
Me: No, I can't sir..
Teach: But you must boy. This is in the interests of science, the advancement of mankind...

(You may seriously wonder why the advancement of mankind and science in the world depends upon a spotty 13 year old oik torturing the repulsive remains of a bulls cadaver, I certainly did then and still do now, but realised it would be unhealthy to ask the question, the biology teacher was a sadist)

Me: No sir... I just can't sir...
Teach: For pities sake boy just stab it!

(By this time Teach has severely raised his voice, his eyes are popping and he's clenched his hands into a tight fist, never a good sign. The entire class, sensing immediate entertainment, stops stabbing at the eyes, smelly Terry takes the opportunity to taste the lens he's just hacked out... and the classroom goes quiet.)

Me: No sir.. I really can't..
Teach: My god... Why not?
Me: ... Its looking at me...

I felt this was a good reason but as the class exploded, along with more bullseyes. It earned me a detention, spent having to closely examine the bits cut out by the class, including a lens with teethmarks... erm...

So I really have a thing about eyes. Consequently the optician is not the best place for me.
In fact I prefer the dentist... a lot. Give me a root canal any day over an eyetest. You know what's being done, teeth are simple, hard enamel sunk into hard jaw, no goo, AND the sound of the drill drowns out all the nasty stuff. Most of all you can't see what he's looking at, ignorance is real bliss. You also get to look up the dentists nose in wonderment at the bogey formations and realise that big bogeys are not the preserve of men, female dentists have huge greenies. Go on... when you're next at the dentist have a look, you really have nothing better to do.

Unfortunately, there's no bogeyspotting at the opticians, you have to look into a mutitude of machines whilst the optician looks into your eyes. Due to using magnifying lenses,theirs look like the bullseyes. I can easily identify the opticians aqueas humour, vitreous humour, lens and retina and it all looks like it would explode if I got out my penknife... No way, find me a dentist and get out the drill...

Finally, however it came. The diagnosis is... I'm a speccy 4 eyes who needs new specs... erk...
And here is the real irony... the maximum NHS dentist cost is about £120 ($170), yet the cost of a much more fearful visit to the opticians... well I consider myself lucky that I've seen change out of a monkey ($750)... BIG OUCH!!!


© OddBat 2009