Week 23: Time is tricky.

Regular programming.

Hi. It's 1:30pm, Saturday, and I'm currently at work. I'm bored out of my mind and whenever I remember I have to stay here till 9pm, I just want to roll on the floor.

I was asked to work in another branch (still within the same area) and I'm the pharmacist in charge—I’m working with a healthcare assistant though. It's just the two of us.

There was something happening with the system, it was really frustrating and I needed a solution before a patient walked in. I realised that I was the one who had to provide the solution myself, so I had to boss up. I was able to resolve it anyway.

I've been on my internship for 2 months now, I will be 3 months into the internship this month. It feels longer than that, time is tricky.

Something I'm learning while working in a community pharmacy is that people have a weird orientation towards service providers. It's always about you you you and you.

They'll walk into the pharmacy, look at the 5 people already there and think “these people are not serious, I should be attended to first”. It always pisses me off. Especially the ones who have the mind to tell you that you should be fast because they have a bike (or someone) outside waiting for them.

I will always think that's a ridiculous thing to say because whatever arrangement you have with whatever outside is between you and them, why are you making it my problem? One would think everyone is playing inside the pharmacy.

Another thing that always makes me laugh is when someone comes into the pharmacy asking for Ampiclox (Ampiclox Beecham, it has to be this one), you start asking them what they want to use it for and they get offended. Some of them act like you've slapped them across the face.

There was someone who came in and started shouting, saying “Am I not an adult, don't I know how my body is doing me?”. You have to wonder when age determines how accurately you can diagnose and prescribe drugs for yourself. Nothing concern Nigerians with antimicrobial resistance.

The one that's even more hilarious is when people come in claiming to have typhoid, and you can't convince them that they don't have typhoid. The symptom is always “na so my body dey do me when I get typhoid”. It's funny and I guess that's what makes community pharmacy an interesting sector in the pharmacy practice. There's also the fact that you have access to different types of cases.

It's now 1:58pm and I'm already really tired of being here. I will end up reading a book or watching a movie when I'm done with this newsletter.

Let me know how you're doing though. I got lovely replies the last time I sent a newsletter and it warmed my heart. Also, if you're not following me on Tiktok or Instagram already, you should (🙂‍↕️).

P.S. If you'd like to appear as a guest on the newsletter this month, do let me know. Just reply to the newsletter.

Books.

I'm currently reading Common Decency by Susannah Dickey. It's about two women who live in the same apartment and eventually become friends (?). One of them is grieving her mother and the other one is having an affair with a married man. If I lock in, I should finish it today (Sunday).

After this, I want to read An Academic Affair by Jodi McAlister. It's romance and I'm hoping these two books get me out of the reading slump I've found myself in these days.

Highlights from Common Decency:

❝

"Hannah has a clipped, fulsome English accent that can reach piccolo-redolent heights in pitch. She relays everything as though being coerced, which makes Lily wonder if her romantic partners feel like they’re blackmailing her. “

❝

"She treated language like a pet ferret she could dress in different outfits, her idiosyncrasies translating into a hyperactive logorrhea. “

❝

"She didn’t want to be looked at, or listened to; she wanted to forget that she had a body.”

❝

"Lily has since wondered if, conversely to how she needs not to be seen, Caz needs to be seen, but as something different from what she is.”

❝

"When she was in her early twenties she did what she referred to as the sleep diet – she’d overdose on antihistamines and sleep through her hunger. She woke up one day and realized she’d misplaced three weeks – she was seven pounds lighter and a month older." (oh?)

❝

"‘Why, miss?’ Kimberly has her hand on her hip, and Siobhán has the thought that Kimberly will be the thirteen-year-old who is convinced by a guy five years older than her to give him a blow job." (that's... not nice.)

❝

"To ascribe undue weight to an interaction is so much more shameful than to have forgotten the interaction, she realized. Forgetfulness is the luxury of a rich existence.”

❝

"she can’t bear the thought of having someone un-love her”

❝

"After meeting Andrew, Siobhán forced herself to read rapaciously, to become au courant with his interests, to become comfortable using au courant in a sentence.”

Some of the highlights are because I have no idea what the words mean, lmao.

Movies.

These are the movies I watched last month. The Twits was so disgusting and a bit funny. Urban Legend was a slasher movie, but it wasn't as good as it could have been. It had potential. I thought Obsession was just there, Tiktok made me watch it anyway.

God, I loved The Florida Project. I cried at the end. Sobbing even. I watched Apex with my flatmate, it was such a meh movie.

Something else I watched was Margo's got money troubles, it's a series and it was adapted from the book. I loved it, and one of the things that made watching it even better was the fact that I was watching it with my flatmate and we had to stop several times to talk about it.

I currently want to watch Speed Demon and The Last Whale Singer, I don't even know where I saw the recommendations from.