I am visiting my father in hospital. My partner is with me this means my father and I are limited in what we can talk about as 2 hours of football is not really polite, something that occurs to my father when she is about, which is an odd experience for me.

Football does get a bit of a spell in the dialogue. My father can’t believe how ugly England’s manager is. Apparently we should have a good looking manager like Jose Mourhino. He is also disgusted that Ray Lewington is England’s assistant as Lewington is also ugly and he doesn’t know who he is. The hes there were all my dad. I think Mourhino knows who Ray Lewington is. It is possible he doesn’t.

Somehow I find myself in a heated conversation about flags, crests and coats of arms. Quite. My dad seems to think I’ve made up the British coat of arms. “I’ve never seen it,” he claims. I tell him he’s definitely seen it in his life and he’s just a dick.

The obvious direction for the conversation to take is how my dad would go to war in his current health if it meant protecting the country. I suggest that he would have quite happily been part of a nazi regime if they’d made a pint cheaper. He correctly assumes that I’d be avoiding combat at all costs in this hypothetical military conflict taking place all over this hypothetical Britain. You protect the ones with brains, I point out – agreeing with him that he could be used as cannon fodder.

Intermittently the man in the next bed chips in to the conversation. I want to tell him to fuck off, I’m here to see my dad and not put up with his shit. It’s bad enough talking to someone who talks shit but you genetically bound to love. This chap from St Helens claims there is pub that he goes in that has ten guest ales every day – ten different ones each day. I can’t be bothered that he’s talking shit.

I can be bothered talking about what kind of German I’d have been with my dad. He thinks I’d have been OK with the whole Nazi thing. I tell him the clothes were good and think I’d be the guy in Escape to Victory who is OK to the prisoners of war team. If you haven’t seen Escape to Victory then just think of the Russian general who ends up cheering for Rocky in Rocky IV. If you haven’t seen Escape to Victory or Rocky IV then you should probably sort your life out.

We also discuss what kind of East German I might have been. Again my dad seems to think I’d have been part of the Stasi. He really respects me.

We must have done something right because the man in the next bed has put his headphones on and isn’t trying to get involved anymore.