"Ooh, you're wearing jeans. We'll have to take those down past your knees"

An oddly sensual conversation don't you think? Especially as I'd only just met her...

Locked in a small cubicle on a low seat while she sat on a tall stool uncomfortably inside my personal space, it was a bizarre morning. The first iron law of cancer treatment is that no matter where you go you will discover that you have broken an unwritten rule. In this case, wearing jeans. Despite receiving joining instructions and a confirmation phone call I'd somehow missed the fatwa on wearing jeans for a PET-CT scan. Hence her eagerness that I should wear them past my knees. Normally when a young lady in a uniform starts talking about removing my jeans it costs me a lot of money, not to mention some subterfuge. On the NHS though, such things are free - the second iron law of cancer treatment being that you should try to wring some hope and humour from whatever is happening in the moment. It might be your last.

My next task was to sign the obligatory get out clauses - do you agree that even though we are going to stab you with a needle, inject you with radioactive isotope and whiz you through a scanner, anything that goes wrong is your fault? Yes. I do (see first law - it's always your fault).

Apparently a pantechnicon is a large van for carrying furniture. I never really understood the word before but it's on the only suitable word to describe this 'portable' PET-CT scanner parked up in the grounds of Colchester Hospital. More like the kind of tour bus favoured by pop legends it has a scanner, some seats, intimate cubicle (above) and a kind of hitech control room with screens and dials. Three operators run tag team - getting the all important signature, injecting, running away, escorts to the special toilet etc.

Which brings us to the third iron law of cancer treatment - at some point, everyone you meet will want to make a hole in you. Sure enough we soon got to the cannula part. I did my best to ruin his day by setting him up to fail "My veins are really hard to find, lots of people have probems." Kinda stupid when you think about it but it gives me a sick pleasure (see second law). He passed with flying colours only telling me afterwards that he'd been on holiday for two weeks and I was the first since getting back. The sweat and shaking should have been a clue.

Coordinating three patients and three staff in the CT Caravan is an art. Strapped to a syringe of saline I returned to the unshielded part were all the radioactive people get to sit. He returned carrying a lead lined case which opened to reveal a lead coated syringe (I'm not joking) full of radioactive glucose. He shoved this in, followed by the saline, and then retreated, all with rather too much haste for my liking. It got more surreal. I sat for an hour while my insides brewed nicely. Next, Iady nurse taking tag back, she escorted me to the special toilet where only the irradiated can pee. Festooned with warning notices I imagine this is cleaned by people in hazchem suits, although not recently.

Bladder empty as per instructions, I took my place on the scanning table. Aforementioned jeans to half-mast. Disappointingly I had to do this myself. Arms above the head and stay still for 20 mins. Of course, my face began to itch. (Fourth law of cancer treatment: body has a mind of it's own). The table raised itself and poked me in and out of a big polo mint while I did my best to sink into a trance.

Some music played but I couldn't make it out over the whine of the scanner. At least it didn't try and talk to me like the other CT scanners do. There is nothing more annoying than a machine trying to be chirpy especially one programmed by a Japanese engineer with only a hazy grasp of English.

Still radioactive I was released into the wild with instructions to stay clear of pregnant women and small children for six hours. No imagination these people - a fading green glow would be far more exciting (think Ready Brek) but it was very dull. No nausea, no coloured wee, not even any superpowers. 

Results in a week or so.