Getting the Flu Shot

I had called our family doctor on Monday to ask which flu shot we should get considering our health issues and he said to get the seasonal one, so Arend and I went to the Royal Canadian Legion at 11:15 Tuesday morning to get them. (The seasonal shots were being given starting at 11 AM, the H1N1 shots were to start at 1 PM.)

Even though it is just across the street, we drove because we were going to run some errands afterwards. I pulled into a handicapped parking spot by the back door of the Legion and Arend started to get out. The "guard" at the door told him to just stay in the car and he would call us when it got closer to the time for us to go in thus avoiding having to stand for a long time. (There was a line of about 40 people waiting to go in. What we didn't know was that there were probably another 40 already inside.)

We took his advice and waited in the car watching as he let four people at a time go inside. However, he forgot where our place in line was supposed to be and when people who arrived after we did started going in, I got out of the car. He immediately realized that he had made a mistake, but he still put us at the end of the line which meant we continued to wait. Finally we got to go in and that is when we saw that we were only halfway through the process. By the time we finally got to the "injection seats" we had been there for two hours. Then, when the nurse saw my birth date, she told me I couldn't have the seasonal shot because I was too young! Two hours of waiting for nothing.

However, since by then it was after 1 PM I thought I would try to go through the line for the H1N1 shot. I asked the man who was "running the show" if I could get back in line for the H1N1 shot and he said, "Of course!" So I did. Ten minutes later I was done and sitting waiting for my 15 minutes to be up. (No two-hour wait for H1N1.) By the time we got home, we had been gone almost three hours (and we never did get those errands run!)

While we were waiting after the shots, we were talking to some friends who were also waiting. They had gotten both shots because the health nurse recommended it since they are with their grandchildren a lot (ages, 2, 3, and 4). That made me glad I had gotten the H1N1 shot. The nurse had told them that they have lots of the H1N1 vaccine, but not a lot of the seasonal one.

Later on that afternoon, Arend was reading his e-mail and saw that the College staff and students have a clinic on Thursday, so he is going to go to that and get the H1N1 shot so he can play with the little ones, too! LOL Granddaddy got his seasonal shot the last time he was at Dr. Garcia's.

If you are wondering which shot to get, or even if you should get one at all, I hope all of you will decide to get the H1N1 shot.

Till next time,
Willa Dale