Blood Center

So, I'm at the blood center for my 10:10 appointment. I've missed a couple of months, but I'm usually pretty good about my 6-weekly 'dates.' [Hey, I got a windbreaker today...why not?] I feel like the pool of donors is shrinking daily, so I go. It's much less awful than it was 10 years ago, actually.

But anyway....it was chilly inside the building. It's actually in a strip mall, but it's all one room. I had on a fleece over a T-shirt and was fine. But they had a guy in one of the prep rooms getting ready to do a Red Cell Apheresis, which takes a long time and I keep thinking I should do, but I can't face a needle in my arm for hours...I'm a wimp.

They couldn't get this guy set up because it was too cold in the building. There is a minimum temp allowable because they don't want people getting sick from having cold blood put back into them. (see, that's why I can't do this!) And the room wasn't warm enough. So the guy waited around for about 90 minutes, but it just never warmed up enough in the room, so they had to send him away.

The funniest thing: the donor was the former mayor of my town. I said hi, he said hi--he had no flippin' idea who I am. But he's nice guy.

I need to find out about doing this. It isn't that complicated. I'm just a wimp.

Moral: If you aren't excluded, you should be giving blood. Someone needs it.