I have to start answering the cafe telephone with "Grumpy & The Dreaded One's Little Cafe Of Awesome, this Grumpy speaking."Because today I picked up and simply said "This is Lee speaking."
"Hello. This is Dorothea from the Women's Hospital."
St Vincents Hopital is nearby and we have a lot of doctors, nurses, ambos and hospital admin people as customers, so this didn't seem odd. "Oh yes? Hello."
"I'm just calling to let you know that we have an ET scheduled for Monday."
Slight pause. Was Dorothea shortening this from ETA? For Estimated Time of Arrival? The ETA for a reserved table perhaps? Didn't seem likely as we had no tables reserved for Monday.
"An ET, you say?", I said, craftily stalling for time whilst trying to figure out what the hell Dorothea was talking about.
"Yes."
"For Monday?"
"That's right."
"Okay. Just one thing... what's an ET?"
Slight pause while Dorothea obviously tried to figure out why I wouldn't know what an ET is.
"An embroyo transfer," she explained, a tone that said isn't that really, really, really obvious?
"Ah. In that case I'm reasonably sure you have the wrong number. We're a new little cafe on Getrude Street."
"Ah. Oh. Okay. Sorry. Goodbye."
