I’ve been very fortunate. Only once in my seventy-plus years have I ever spent a night in hospital. It was a horrible, and entirely unnecessary, experience.

Picture the scene: it’s early afternoon on the first day of 1973, and I emerge from Ryrie’s Bar into bright sunlight. Next thing, I’m lying on an Edinburgh Royal Infirmary hospital bed, curtains drawn. Eventually, a young doctor appears, and the second question I ask is, “Where am I?”

The doctor – a junior registrar not much older than me – says he thinks I’ve had an ‘epileptiform’ attack. He takes blood and urine tests, tells me to watch the booze in future, then sends me packing.

A few days later, I get a telephone call from my GP, who’s received a letter from this young, hyper-enthusiatic medic. It seems that my blood and urine tests are ‘too normal’ for someone who’s just had an epileptic fit; I might instead have a ‘this-oma’ or a ‘that-oma’ – even I know that this is doctor-speak for ‘brain tumour’. The letter says that the doctor wants me to come in for a week of tests. I beat that down to one night: apparently, all he wants is a whole week’s pee. I point out that there are outpatient ways around that task.

A hypochondriac at the best of times, I’m convinced I’m dying by the time I report for my inpatient stay at ERI’s General Medical Ward. The enormous main ward, frankly, is a shock. There are too many bed-blockers with nowhere else to go, often elderly people with dementia. One old guy wanders around wearing only a pyjama jacket. At least I’m in a side room with three others. One, a former Dunfermline footballer, asks why I’m there. I explain I’m just in overnight for tests. “Aye, that’s what they told me, too,” he replies, “and I’ve been here four weeks now.” Thanks.

Eventually, the young doctor appears; he wants to give me a lumbar puncture. As soon as he begins, he realises that there’s nothing wrong with me – he’s almost disappointed. Lumbar punctures can leave you with excruciating headaches for a week, though, and if done wrongly, can be dangerous. I just had the excruciating headaches. Today, my own son’s a hospital consultant. His response to me being given a lumbar puncture was what his generation shortens to “WTF!”

Even in the 1970s, I realised that there was plenty wrong with the old Infirmary; sorry, but the new version is a big improvement. But the doctor went on to become famous… in another field altogether.

There was nothing wrong with me. Except… I mentioned that my second question was “Where am I?” My first was “What’s the score?” Hibs fans will know the answer: Hearts 0 Hibs 7. I was on my way to Tynecastle, and as a lifelong Jambo (Hearts fan), my DNA clearly decided that I should simply be spared the pain. Perhaps the medical profession should note ‘scarf colour’ as a symptom.