Warning, this post is in bad taste! Read on at your peril!

The French government have sent me several letters since I turned 50 about diagnosing bowel cancer. The accompanying blurb said that next time I went to the doctor's I should ask him whether I ought to take the test. I go to the doctors so rarely that in the end they sent me the test! In brief, I had to poo into a dish and take samples, smear said samples onto cardboard and send back to them. The first problem was that the poo must NOT be contaminated with any liquid. I don't know about you, but I sometimes have to wee either just before or after a bowel emptying. What a palaver! Each time I had a stirring, I had to run upstairs, find my plastic ice cream container, put it in the toiler bowl, then get my plastic goblet (specially bought for the purpose) and put that in position in case I weed. It reminded me of when I was pregnant and had to do all those mid-flow samples. Of course, by this time, the urge had gone away. I ended up so stressed about this procedure that I actually got constipated! I got there in the end, but now I find my piles have come back with a vengeance! (More memories of pregnancy) And, I'm blaming the French government! Time I left this bloody country!