Slate Tile Shingles

This post is all about my recent adventures in medicine. Over the last two weeks, I’ve had two doctor appointments, not for anything serious, just regular checkups. In both appointments I was asked, “Have you recently been to West Africa or the Arabian Peninsula? Have you been in contact with anyone who has Ebola or MERS?” Today when I was again asked these questions, I started to tell my Ebola joke, “Did you hear the joke about Ebola? You probably won’t get it.” The receptionist who had just questioned me thought it was hilarious. Later, the Med Tech who weighed me and took my information asked me the same questions. My joke got a big laugh out of her too. After I was wrapping up with the doctor, I tried going for three, but he didn’t get the joke and it had to be explained. It tuned out that he was in Dallas at the height of the Ebola scare there. He and his wife were there helping their daughter get her house ready to sell. It developed that the boyfriend of one of the two Ebola nurses works with their daughter. I guess that explains why he didn’t find my joke funny.

The slate shingles photo with this post is in honor of me getting my shingles vaccine. I got it at the grocery store, which was an eye opener. Pharmacy chains like Walgreens and CVS are gearing up to become everyone’s go to place for routine medical services. Our local grocery store is no different. I stopped in there on Saturday morning and showed them my script for a shingles vaccine, filled out their form and was told to come back in half-an-hour. They need time to process the request. I wasn’t sure how they would administer the vaccine. I hoped that they wouldn’t inject me over the counter and I didn’t think that they would let me come around behind the counter either. There are controlled substances back there. As it turned out, there was a bench around the corner and a pharmacist came out with his plastic bucket of stuff. This bench was in a busy part of the store, so people were coming and going all of the time. An elderly woman came by and asked in which aisle something or another was in. When she saw what was occurring, she had to stay and see the show. She was only a little put out, when I jokingly threatened to charge her admission. In the end, it wasn’t pretty, but it was cheap. In a way it was like the old-time traveling medicine show of the past, only with less alcohol and no opium.