Booster efforts

 I hadn't been overly worried about covid for a while. There didn't seem to be an awful lot of it around, and a didn't find myself in high-risk situations very much. But then do things happened: my plans to travel over Christmas, and omicron. And suddenly the threat came closer.

The radio and newspapers were emphasising that being double-vaccinated gave you good resistance against the Delta variant, but for the omicron variant; not so much. And that was quickly becoming the dominant variant. And I was among the lucky ones; I have had two Pfizer inoculations, which seems to give you a 40% immunity against omicron. Two AstraZenecas seem to only give you some 20%. But 40% still isn't anywhere near 100%! So booster seemed to be a good idea.

One day an email came through; a medical centre about an hour's drive to the west offered boosters to people who were members of emergency services. Being in cave rescue, I count as that. But how often do I actually end up rescuing anyone? I decided to let that pass by. I would just wait my turn. 

Then a text message came through; a friend had been alerted by his neighbour that there was a drop-in session in Bangor. Well if you can just appear unannounced, why not? So I chanced it. I went quite late, though, and by the time I got there they had run out. Oh well. Bangor isn't far, and I got to listen to Joe Lycett being silly on the radio on the way back.

The next thing that happened was another message from a friend; she had seen that you could now book an appointment! As soon I saw that I went to the site. You could book slots in Bangor! There were even slots available for the next day. I picked one I thought I could do and filled out my details. When I got to the end of that, the site told me someone had beaten me to it. The slot was taken! I went back to the calendar that had the days with slots available in black. The next day was now grey. It hadn't just been the one slot I had chosen that had been taken! They all had. But to make things worse; all other days were now greyed out as well. Oh dear. I quickly had a look if there are other locations. And I saw Caernarfon offered slots as well. I quickly selected one, and filled out my details again. And this time I was quick enough! I could get my booster on Sunday morning! And Caernarfon is only a little bit further than Bangor. The vaccination site is even on my side of town. I'm sorted!