A COUNTRY PRACTICE
Michael Langley

Brett joined A Country Practice in September 1987 and stayed until March 1989. On arriving in the Valley, his character of Michael was knocked off his motorbike and slightly injured by schoolgirl Jo Loveday. For Jo it was love at first sight but for Michael it took a little longer. Because of the accident, Michael first turned up at the hospital as a patient. He'd come to the Valley as an agency nurse but was then persuaded to stay on by Matron Maggie Sloan even though his larrikin ways irratated her at times.

The turning point for Michael and Jo's love came when he was very seriously injured in another motorbike accident. He had to undergo major surgery without a vital blood transfusion because his rare blood group wasn't in the hospital's blook banks. Just as supplies of the right blood arrived at the hospital by helicopter, Michael went into cardiac arrest and had to be resuscitated by Doctor Terence Elliott. While recovering from his injuries, Michael realised his love for Jo and eventually proposed.

Their marriage though didn't go exactly to plan. The bucks' night was a disaster when Gloria Mundi, an opera singer from the Burrigan Lyric Opera Society arrived instead of Fatima, the voluptious belly dancer, Fabulous Fatima "who flaunts her flesh in a flourish of erotic undulations" turned up at the girl's night! On the day of the Ceremony, a load of quarantined goats escaped from the truck which Sergeant Frank Gilroy was escorting to the railyards. In the ensuing melee, marriage celebrant Ed Wilson was hit in the rear end by a transquilliser dart and was left incapable of conducting the wedding service. But the day was saved by Aboriginal Reverand Steve Murray, and Jo and Michael were finally married and left the Valley.