Being Brave

It has taken almost a year, but we finally got our shingles vaccine today. The doctors apparently talked it up so much that there was no vaccine to be found anywhere. Why did the doctors talk it up so much when even they didn't have any?

We had laboriously laid plans for John to pick me up after Pilates so that we could go around the corner to Costco whose pharmacy had been recommended by John's doctor. They didn't have shingles vaccine either the first time we enquired, but they took our names and called us when they got some in. I forgot my medical cards and John had his card but was in a race to fill out his form before me, and didn't put his number on his either.  We don't know if we both paid full price or if they found our numbers somewhere and what we paid was a copay. A woman in a hijab standing next to us with a child practicing his attention getting screaming technique while she talked on the phone and studied the label on a giant bottle of Advil did nothing to help us clear up our confusion. John seemed singularly disinterested in finding out whether we could have paid less if we'd been more together....

The pharmacist was a very pleasant and efficient person of indeterminate gender who gave us our injections, applied bandaids and told us to come back in two months for the second shot. Having seen John's mother suffer through a case of the shingles, we are both quite determined to avoid the same fate, even if we have to pay full price again.

Shopping in Costco was equally disorienting. The lights in there always make me dizzy, the room in which the packaged salads are kept is so cold that I can never decide which one to buy and it is always just TOO MUCH. We left with sore arms, an enormous bag  of almonds and more Mediterranean salad than we can possibly eat before it goes bad, even if we have it three times a day.

We were almost home when we realized that John had not dropped me off at my car parked at the Pilates studio. 

It's not just us...Caroline is on her way back to get her money which she forgot to take with her when she finished cleaning our house this morning....