Eye hospital dickface

[Helenahandkart]

I’ve just come here to rant.
I had a five hour round trip to the eye hospital today, which involved waking up at 5.30am and receiving some upsetting news.

When I came out after my appointment I could hardly see anything due to eye drops/dilation. I rushed to the bus stop. I couldn’t accurately read the small clock on my phone but there was either a bus due any minute, or I might have to wait in the rain for half an hour in which case I may as well start walking home.

I politely asked a passing man if he had the time. He didn’t. My phone was in my hand so I held it up and said ‘Please could you read this? I’ve just been to the eye hospital and I can’t see it’. Before I’d finished the sentence he looked me up and down contemptuously and said with a sneer ‘I don’t have time for this. I’m in a dash’ and walked off.

What a dick.
It would have taken him one second to glance at my phone and tell me the time.

Even the most respectable looking people can have an agenda I would never go on appearances to trust some random.
I guess that makes me a dick too but I don't really care, I'm naturally cynical and wary.

Those eye hospitals have a lot to answer for IMHO - been going to them for many years!

Exactly he might not have time as he is late for an appointment or someone he knows is dying there. Or anything. He doesn't owe you the time. Yes in an ideal world people would be able to stop and help you tell the time from your phone but we are all busy and if its a city centre environment there are lots of dodgy chancers around.

I"m having a cataract removed this week. So I've had eye drops previously and when I left the hospital to get the bus to the station the driver pulled away before I'd sat down and then had to pull away sharply throwing me across the bus. The ligament damage took 18 months to repair.

I would have said I had eye drops and asked. Most people would help.

This is a sad sign of the times isn't it. I would have helped you without another thought but people don't give a shit about others now as a rule and don't want to interact with strangers. I was attacked on a thread a while ago for suggesting people should reply if you say good morning to them. I hope you are home and safe now and sorry you had upsetting news.

I cannot believe this thread. People are literally scared to tell a lady what the time is?

It's not a case of fear. It's weariness from all the times someone (often superficially respectable looking) has started by asking the time/directions, then segued into a tale about losing their wallet and needing to get to the hospital. At which point you look at them more closely and realise there's something not quite right about them - in this case big freaky pupils - and that your time is being wasted. Again.

So he could have been nicer about it, but I think he believed the OP was up to something. Which was naturally very upsetting for her because she just wanted to go home after a crappy day.

I see a lot of people being kind generally, and I have been to others in return

but I have also been in a rush, time off watch ok but more I may have not

I still think there’s a lot of kindness around

Do not over think it OP. You may have asked the next person and had a totally different response. You were feeling vulnerable so will not have been as resilient as usual to self-absorbed randoms. Most people are generally decent and ok humans- even in moments of their own personal distress (if indeed this was the case) being kind to others even in a small way makes most people feel slightly better for a second or two. I remember after DH died a very minor act of unkindness on a bus (cannot remember why but could not take car). Usually I would have brushed it off but it really upset me because of everything else going on.

Manners and kindness cost nothing, trite but true. They make a real difference to the recipient. Some of the answers on this thread are really sad and show how insular people have become. I fail to see how a woman, outside a hospital, where bus stops are usually crowded and lots of people are around, in working hours poses such a risk people would not help her see the time.

He might not have heard you properly and probably just assumed you were about to bother him.

The miserable bastard. Hope you're ok.

This, and did the clinic not ask you how you were getting home?

Sadly it’s par for the course. I am visually impaired and very rarely will I ask a member of the public for help with anything because some people are just not nice.

Op I can't believe people are giving you such a hard time. You sounded perfectly reasonable.

Since when does a man feel threatened by a woman asking what the time is? It's such a small request. I despair I really do.

Yes he was a massive twat. And so are a lot of posters in here.

You had a shite day and he made it worse.

How do you know he wasn't having a bad day?

How do you know he heard what the OP said?

How do you know he could read the OP's phone?

How do you know he could speak fluent English?

I don't always wear a watch. My phone is in my bag. I would be wary of someone sticking their phone in my face. If I had a watch on I would answer but if I didn't then I might not.

Sorry you were having a rubbish day op, and hope you got home ok. But equally he might be having a bad day too.

See I don't get this. Why should you expect a response when you say good morning to a stranger?

I would normally, but my hearing isn't great, especially in a busy environment- I may just not have heard someone. There have been times where I'm focused on what I need to do in town so dont concentrate on what strangers who generally aren't talking to me are saying.

If you are having medical treatment affecting your vision, call the hospital transport team assigned to your department. It may take a bit of chasing around, or enlisting the help of health volunteer services available in many communities, but saves you from being in a vulnerable position. I had an ambulance bring me from London to Devon after surgery last year as I wasn't deemed safe on public transport, and could not drive due to my treatment.

Whatever he thought, for whatever reason, YANBU just for the title Eye Hospital Dickface

10/10 🤣

Wow. Some of the responses on this thread are amazing.

To answer a few questions:
it was a five hour round trip because it was a 30 minute walk in each direction, a three and a half hour appointment (lots of waiting for scans/specialists) and a 30 minute wait in the pharmacy afterwards.

I could see well enough to tentatively cross the road, see someone’s face, read the bus timetable. I had been advised in advance by the hospital not to drive home. I have had these eye drops before and knew that I would be able to walk home safely, and my plan b was to get a taxi if I found it too difficult to see.

I could not see well enough to read the tiny font on my phone screen. My phone doesn’t have internet so asking Google for the time wasn’t an option.

I was standing alone at the bus stop. It was neither busy nor empty on the pavement, in a low crime area of town. I am a petite, average looking, unremarkably dressed woman. I did not look like a deranged junkie, regardless of how big my pupils were behind my glasses. He was over six foot. He was strolling slowly down the road, smiling, carrying a bunch of about two dozen pink roses. There was no one else close to me who might have been my co-conspirator in any kind of scam.

I politely asked if he had the time, he stopped, said he didn’t and made a guess at what the time might be, at which point I asked if he could read it off my phone (I needed the exact time to know whether I had just missed the bus). The moment I started talking he started to walk away and looked me up and down with a disdainful sneer. His behaviour was peculiar.

He wasn’t in a rush. He wasn’t threatened by me. He wasn’t having a bad day, strolling along smiling with his flowers. He spoke English. He just couldn’t be bothered to wait for a second.

I have been alive long enough to have been approached by beggars and junkies. I know the old ‘ask the time and then launch into a story about needing money’ blag. This didn’t look anything like that.

Thank you everyone who has asked whether I’m ok 🙂 His behaviour was the final straw and made me cry at the bus stop, but I caught the bus home eventually.
It just made me reflect on how easy it is to spoil someone’s day with a second’s worth of unkindness.

I’m absolutely amazed at how paranoid everyone is about being scammed/robbed in the street. Maybe I live in a particularly easy going town or something.

I think it just depends

I live in London and even then I see people helping strangers out - loads

I’ve had it and offered it to others, but sometimes people make a snap judgement

I appreciate you had a bad day but you should have got a taxi if you're not fit to travel. You are a grown up so you need to be more responsible. You don't know if he was in a rush or if he had awful social anxiety but I don't think it's fair to jump to the conclusion that it's okay to call him a dickface because he didnt look at your phone for you. I think you're taking out the frustration of your day on a random stranger who was just minding their own business.

You are being very unreasonable to turn a 30 minute walk into a 5 hour round trip.

I was fit to travel. I just couldn’t read a tiny clock. There was nothing irresponsible about my behaviour - what a bizarre thing to say.
He wasn’t in a rush - he was strolling!