Well, I just barely started the blue "Exchange Bag."

I have it with me because today is flu-shot day. The local health department is setting up on campus to administer flu shots. It was presented to us as a "faculty, staff, and students" thing but they've advertised it on the local television so I expect crowds similar in size (but older in age) to the crowds for the new "wii" if not for the new playstation. So I am going early, and I am taking something to work on.

For some reason - even though there has been a projected excess of flu vaccine - the local health departments have been very slow to get their shipments, or have only got partial shipments. This makes me twitch a bit and worry about the future - if government-run medicine comes to pass, they are going to HAVE to be better about how they distribute things. I am fairly sure it's because there's less profit from the health departments than from individual doctors, but still. It seems that any bureaucracy around here (other than the Tribal bureaucracies, and not being "part of an Indian*" I'm not eligible for services from them) seem very good at wrapping simple things in a veritable swaddling of red tape and delays.

(*One of the friends I had when I was growing up - her mother was part Cherokee - once announced proudly that her mother was "part of an Indian." I think - if family legend is correct - I kind of looked at her and said, "Which part?")

Posts the next couple days will be sporatic or absent; my parents are due to arrive around noon today.