Carnage… absolute carnage. And I’m not talking about the latest news which locks everyone in the south-east in their homes over Christmas. I’m talking about taking Mum to have her COVID vaccination today.
The doctor’s surgery was being run like a military operation and very efficiently, I might add. The only problem, of course, was the car parking. Nightmare. I mean, they had plenty of marshals and everything, directing the traffic and letting people in and out, but there were just too many cars to park in a small area. Many people were parking on the road outside and walking in, but that wasn’t an option with Mum. We sat outside in the roadway for a good eight minutes or so, which meant that, inevitably, we were going to be late for the appointment. Not that it mattered – lots of people were late due to the stationary nature of the traffic.
We eventually nosed our way to the entrance of the car park where a marshal spoke to us. I explained that I needed to get right up to the doorway, as Mum couldn’t manage the walk. As luck would have it, one of the nurses was coming down with a wheelchair, so I commandeered it and the nurse took Mum up to the queue while I popped the car into a wide car parking spot.
However, when I got up to the queue, which was outside, Mum was juddering with cold and the nurse was telling me she couldn’t go in and have her vaccination after all. Whaaat? Well, it transpires that Mum had said she hadn’t been very well this morning and had been hot. Naturally, the nurse heard alarm bells and consulted the doctor who said, ‘No. No vaccination.’
Ha! Fight me? I carefully explained that Mum was perfectly well and she liked to make people think she wasn’t, just for the sympathy vote. I also explained that the hot flush she’d had was when I’d told her she was going for an injection. Panic had set in. She kept looking at me balefully, saying, “Well, I don’t much fancy that.” As if I was going to change my mind. No, I don’t think so, Mum. Even the chivvying that the very first person in the world to have the vaccine was a lady in her nineties from Coventry, hadn’t encouraged Mum to be brave.
Anyway, the doctor said, ‘OK, then’ and we made our way inside. By now, I’d taken my coat off and wrapped Mum up in it to stop her shivering. “Aren’t you cold, Anne, without your coat?” she asked. Actually, I wasn’t. It was a balmy 11 degrees, very little wind, with the sun shining, so it was quite pleasant.
In the end, Mum had the vaccination without too much fuss and we waited the requisite 15 minutes afterwards in case she had a reaction before we trundled our way back to the car. All good. That is, until I tried to get out of the car park. Some idiot had parked randomly and far too close at forty-five degrees behind me. One of the young marshals apologised, saying, “I didn’t tell her to park there. She just did. It’s not a designated parking space.” Ah…..I realised that. And no amount of shifting my car backwards and forwards was going to change the angle of dangle. I was stuck there until the errant driver came back. Which she did. Fifteen minutes later.
Once we got back to Mum’s I did my best to make sure she was relaxed and over her ordeal. But, in the end, I gave her paracetamol and a cup of tea and just hoped for the best. She couldn’t eat her lunch – by now she’d got indigestion. Oh dear. How horrible it is to suffer with your nerves. But it’s funny too, in a weird way, and we laughed about it a bit. In Mum’s case, her nerves make her a hypochondriac. But there is also another manifestation. Her anxiety makes her nose run. This is why she has hankies galore dotted about the place. Honestly, there are hundreds of them. I think they spawn when I’m not looking. And she’d had tried to blow her nose through the visor when we were at the surgery, making everyone laugh, because, of course, she couldn’t actually get at her nose.
Other than all of that, we’ve had a day of working hard – not always with the best results. I was alright, Jack. I was wrapping parcels and got a good few done. John wasn’t alright, Jack. He was trying to fit the dishwasher. It’s been in, out, up, down and all over the place. It’s not playing ball. So he’ll have to have another go at it tomorrow.
And in better news, Bill Bailey won Strictly. Gosh, I was thrilled. Doing it for the oldies. Good on him. John wondered who’d danced the best, but I scornfully told him that it wasn’t about the best dancing now. Now, it was a popularity contest. And I don’t think Bill danced the best this evening, but still glad he won.
So, COVID and the handling of the pandemic is all over the news (not that I am watching it, mind you) as ‘Christmas is cancelled’. Ahem. Excuse me? Apologetic cough. Christmas is not cancelled. The family get togethers are, and the drinks in the pubs and the parties in the nightclubs. But the symbolic remembrance of the Christ-child being born isn’t cancelled. We can all still do that, wherever we are and whoever we’re with. So I hope we all will.
In the meantime, the COVID figures remain high and, as of Saturday 19 December, they are thus:
- 27,052 people were confirmed as infected with the virus today
- 534 people died from it today
- Nearly 2 thousand people were admitted to hospital today (1,907)
- 235 people died from COVID in hospitals over the last couple of days
- Today is Day 3 of our second go at Tier 3, which makes it Day 18 since we were told not to visit family
- And we are on Day 276 since the beginning of cabin fever in March
Do take care. I am sending love to everyone, but especially to those who have just had to cancel their plans for a family Christmas. It’s heartbreaking. But I am still consoling myself that being cautious now will offer us time together in the future.
God bless.