Saturday, April 17, 2021Tonight's picture was taken in April of 2009. Mattie was going through a pasta and pizza phase. We went to the neighboring restaurant to the hospital and made his food request happen. Mattie LOVED the container the food came in, because he thought it was a clever way to park his cars! Leave it to Mattie! He was full of creativity, and despite how awful he was feeling, he bought into the fact that he needed treatment, because he trusted us and our decisions.
Quote of the day: Tonight's coronavirus update from Johns Hopkins.
- Number of people diagnosed with the virus: 31,610,695
- Number of people who died from the virus: 566,714
Last Saturday, I got into bed at around 10:30pm, Los Angeles time. I checked my emails before closing the lights, and I saw that I received an email from DC Department of Health, saying that I qualified for the COVID vaccine. I truly wasn't expecting this, since I signed up with DC months ago and never heard a time. But last week, I also re-registered Peter and me on the DC Department of Health website.
Given the email, I jumped out of bed and began following the links to see if I could get an appointment. I saw appointments available, so I ran downstairs so I could register Peter and I at the same time. I logged into Peter's email and he too was approved. So I got him his first vaccine date for today at 2:45pm. He was set! While registering him, I was processing myself on my cell phone. But my phone was on LA time! So though I thought I was booking a 1:30pm (closer to Peter's time) appointment, I landed up at 4:30pm East Coast time.
After we parked near the Arena Stage in DC (a mass vaccine site), I decided to walk in with Peter to make a case to take me early. I didn't even have to ask twice, the person checking us in was happy to take me early, as long as I had an appointment for today!
Our vaccine site was run by MedStar Health, and they were efficient, professional, and very user friendly. I was expecting LONG lines, chaos, and a challenging experience. I got the exact opposite. In fact the person giving me the vaccine was a nursing student. We got into talking immediately. Try 20 minutes! I took so long, that Peter thought something was wrong with me! The student was very kind, understanding, and we talked about cancer and what else.... Mattie Miracle! She even wanted the website, because she wants to look at the Psychosocial Standards of Care.
After the vaccine was administered, I waited in a large area with others, with nurses roaming around checking on us! Very professionally done and we even have a second appointment made and at the same date and time!
