19 September 2008

The Pressure

I remember a time when you could accept a friend’s dinner invitation safe in the knowledge you could look forward to an evening sat on your bottom, gorging yourself on After Eights. Sadly, it would seem those blissful days are gone.

Now that everyone owns such useful ‘gadgets’ as Nintendo Wiis and Brain Trainers, after dinner mints and digestion are out and physical and mental torture are in.

Last week, we went to Accountant’s boss’ house for dinner. Filo pastry with feta cheese for starter, chicken curry for main and a blood pressure test for pudding. His boss stood over me sipping port as he pumped all of the blood from my left bingo wing with his new birthday present. The other guests watched in terror, knowing their turn was coming. He instructed them to relax – it could affect their readings.

“Ooh, that’s very low” he informed me seriously. My curry started to curdle as a familiar terror crept through my stomach.
“It is?” I wondered whether it was a good time to introduce my health anxiety?
“Yes. Let’s do it again!” He sounded excited and pressed the button again for another go.
The other guests look relieved as they enjoyed a momentary reprieve.

Three days later and awaiting my doctor’s appointment to check my low blood pressure, I’d just finished my friend’s risotto when I was plucked from the sofa and deposited onto a white plastic board. She busily waved another device at the tv which beeped a lot. She then turned to me, looking delighted, as she informed me that I was unbalanced, overweight and physically eligible for a free bus pass.

“Now let’s do your mental age” she said, handing me a tiny console. A three stage mathematics and logic challenge followed. “Ooh, you’ve got the brain of a 65 year old!” she cooed. She concluded her findings by softly mentioning that she, 12 years my senior, had the brain age of a 30 year old.

I drove home panic struck. Accountant pretended to listen as I ran through a carefully considered list of degenerative brain diseases.

“Test me. Ask me a maths question” I urged him, desperate for it not to be true.
“What’s 4000 x 0?” came the response.
“That’s not fair! You know I never know the answer to ‘x 0’ questions!”
“Perhaps you should go and see the doctor after all” he suggested helpfully.

In the cold, terror filled hours that followed, I slept fitfully in between reciting my 2, 5 and 10 times tables. When Accountant brought a puzzle book home the next day, I sat down with pencil in hand and my bottom lip sucked in between my teeth.

Five minutes later, staring blankly at all the empty boxes, it struck me that the blinding mental agility I was no doubt capable of would surely be a waste at this stage of the child rearing process. I put the pencil down and watched Peppa Pig with Chick.

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