I spent twelve hours working a night shift, picking up drunks and druggies. Then I had four hours sleep, travelled in to the Apple shop to see a genius. Dealt with my computer then went back to work for thirteen and a half hours without a break, once again dealing with drunks and druggies.

I am having a sense of humour failure.

The previous night had us going to the same drunk twice.

"I vomit", he says in a thick Russian accent as we drag him out of an alleyway. He then spits on the floor, no sign of vomit.

So we take him to hospital where they check him out (even though he is apparently a regular) and discharge him.

A couple of jobs later we are called to him again because he is 'unconscious in a bush'.

Once more, our only real option is to return him to hospital where he settles down to sleep in the waiting room. He isn't homeless, he just gets drunk in the street.

So... Guess who our first patient is on the following shift.

This time I'm so annoyed I call the police on him, they move him along (whatever happened to arresting 'drunk and incapable' people? I'm guessing that they have run out of cells).

The big question will be... Will I see him again tonight?

(Actually, the big question is rather, 'Will he survive seeing me again tonight?').

My laptop will take 7-10 days to repair; which is hassle I could do without. What makes it annoying is that I'm busy over the next week or so, and could have done with it to keep my life in order.

I'm going to have to use my old windows laptop in the meantime as the old Mac that I'm using to type this has a flaky wi-fi adaptor that only works sometimes.

Last night was very busy, I nearly run out of room on the paperwork to list all our jobs. We also had the pleasure of a 'late job'.

Picture the scene, after eleven hours of work without a break we are looking for an 'off job', something nice and simple that means we are at hospital when the end of our shift rolls around.

We get a perfect job sent to our screen, a not seriously injured child, not far from the hospital - it'll do us just fine.

Except, as we arrive on scene we get cancelled for a 'higher priority' job. A transfer from one hospital's ITU to another hospital.

So we turn up and wait an hour and a half for them to get the patient ready for transport. They faff around with lines and drips and photocopying notes while I stand there and watch the minute hand of the clock drift past the end of our shift.

Finally we are on our way, so we whizz to the hospital, off load the patient and then watch as they faff around even more before returning the equipment and travelling doctor back to us.

An hour and a half after our twelve hour shift finishes and I'm falling into my car for the drive home.

I'll be back in ten and a half hours.

For more of the same.

Will the people of Newham survive?