Night shift

My partner on night shift was a chap who takes his career (as opposed to his job, if you see what I mean) terribly seriously. I imagine that he has a Dad's Army style map, with advancing pins and arrows and what-not, up in his garage where he plans his assault on the nursing world. 'Stage four: chief nursing officer, stage five: world domination!' He always asks me what my plans are and is disappointed that I don't have any. 'To become rich and famous through a talent I haven't yet discovered' is not a good career plan, apparently. Last night, as usual, he was asking me searching questions. 'Do you not worry that you're stagnating here?' I considered pointing out to him that I had spent the afternoon talking to a stranger on the internet, pretending to be a middle-aged American school teacher, largely because Monk had finished and I didn't want to get up off the sofa. 'Does that seem like the actions of a person with a career plan? No? Leave me alone, I'm trying to stagnate.'

Then he went for his break and I wrote a story about a piece of oddly placed dog pooh that I have been keeping an eye on for a few weeks.