The Forsythia Saga

Today turned into a bit of a saga. I was up at the usual ungodly hour of 6 am to get ready to take my brother to the station for his morning commute up to London, which was completed as normal and I was back home just after 7 am when the phone rang with my dad saying could I come over straight away as he needed to be taken to A&E.
My dad is 85 and now a bit on the frail side (and very stubborn, which is not the best of combinations) at times but my mind was racing and my heart was thumping but he then explained that the District Nurse had told him that she could not carry out a routine minor medical procedure which normally takes just minutes that he has every few weeks at home and told him he would need to go to A&E.
So I set off right away to get round to his house. When I arrived his wife said he'd been in quite a bit of pain overnight and that she'd thought about calling an ambulance but was worried how long it would take to arrive. I did tell her she could have called me at any time if she'd been worried. My dad, bless him, was having a bit of a struggle getting ready to leave but after an hour and half we finally managed to get out the door.
When we got to the hospital and parked the car there was still of bit of a walk to A&E and dad was a bit out of breath by the time we got there but he was triaged straight away and seen by a nurse within a few minutes. The staff were all lovely and very patient with dad whilst he explained the problem. 
The nurse suggested he have a scan first to check nothing else was causing the pain. This took a bit longer than usual as the scanner wasn't working properly but eventually we were escorted to another part of the hospital where he could wait for treatment. The nurse explained there would be a bit of wait and then gave me a prescription to collect from the onsite pharmacy which was in another part of the hospital. When I handed over the prescription I was told there would be a wait of at least an hour so I headed back to wait for dad to come out as he was now being seen by the nurse.
After another couple of hours, whilst they waited for the scan and blood test results, dad was back out and looked so much better. He was pain free and much calmer but I told him we would need to wait a bit longer until I could collect his prescription. 
I went back to the pharmacy but it still wasn't quite ready and I had to wait another half an hour. Once that was done it was time to walk slowly back to the car, pay for the car park (which I still think is completely wrong when you're taking someone to hospital!) and take dad back home. 
He was so glad to be back home and I told him to ring me if he needed anything else. I headed back home and then almost immediately hit roadworks. By the time I eventually got home, after a quick stop to buy last minute Easter eggs, it was 3.30 in the afternoon. 
I'd not long got back when my sister rang to say she wasn't having a particularly great time on her holiday in the South of France. I must admit my sympathy was in a bit of short supply. Sorry sis!
I was feeling a bit knackered by this stage and I knew I only had a couple of hours before I had to go back out again to pick my brother from the station so I quickly nabbed a shot of our forsythia bush, which only recently burst into bloom, in the back garden for today's image before the light started to fade.
It felt like it had been quite a long day.