You know how they say you should do something every day that frightens you?

(Which I always thought was silly advice, anyway).

Well, I've done it for today.

I got my flu shot. (And yes, getting vaccines DOES frighten me. No, not the content of the vaccine - I'm not one of those "OMG GOVERNMENT MIND CONTROL IN TEH SERUM!!!11!!" type people. It's the needle. I don't like hypodermics. Never have - not since a bad experience when I was a tiny child with receiving a penicillin shot when I had a bad infection. I don't even remember it but I think that must be what triggered the fear. I have irrational visions of the needle somehow breaking off in my arm, which I must fight down every time I go to get vaccinated).

And I can't get the spray vaccine - they don't recommend it for people with asthma, and I figure there has to be a reason for it.

I went to the county health department - it's faster and easier than making a doctor's appointment. They were doing a shot clinic on campus Friday, but my Friday schedule is hectic enough that I'd rather just do it on my day off.

It was pretty efficient - I checked in, read and signed the statement that says, "Yes, I know in rare cases people can have adverse reactions to this shot." Sat and waited for a while - fortunately not long as I didn't bring a book or anything with me. My last experience with the health-department flu vaccine clinic was that it was like a cattle call - people lined up, slowly moved through a labyrinth of stations, and finally led to the shot table (and the shots were given out in the open, four people at a time. I had the misfortune of having to sit next to a young girl - she was perhaps 7 - who was NOT HAPPY and was screaming about getting the flu shot. Doesn't make it any easier when you're already needle averse.)

They called me in, had me go to a private room, the nurse asked me a few questions, and then gave me the shot. Like always, the anticipation is worse than the actual event.

The shot is technically free, but I dropped a sawbuck in the donation container they had out - I'd pay at least that much (or, my health insurance would) at a doctor's, and this health department does a lot of good to help people who DON'T have health insurance to help take care of them.

It's funny how I have to gut myself up for this - on the way over, I kept saying, "It'll be over in a moment." "It will only hurt for a second." "You'll be glad you did this come January when you're in a classroom full of people sneezing and coughing."


****

I worked some on the u-necked vest last night - goodness, but this is close to being finished! I'm working on the back right now (both fronts are done, and yes, I see that Stefanie has errata up on her website, but you know? The fronts look okay to me following what the book said to do). I have a couple more inches to do, then divide for the two back shoulders, then I have the neck and sleeve bands to do - and I'm done!

There's something very satisfying about slowly working through all the projects that have been in-process. I think my next goal is to finish the Miranda socks. Then finish Kenobi.

I've also been doing some digging and rearranging of stash. I may photograph more of it this weekend and stick it up on Ravelry, because, what the heck, you know? I think Ravelry is good for me in that it gets me thinking again about things I purchased a long, long time ago (like the Noro Kureyon for the Rosedale jacket) and makes me want to pull those things out (instead of being tempted to buy NEW yarn for NEW projects).

Ravelry is good and bad for slightly compulsive types like me. Good, because it is a relatively harmless outlet for what I describe as "self-soothing" behaviors - as I said yesterday, instead of shopping for yarn online, I now "shop" for new projects I want to do - which doesn't cost me any money and doesn't take up storage room. And looking at the yarn I already have, posted online, is somehow satisfying. And looking at my projects. And looking at my queue.

And it's also good for me because it does get me thinking about the deep-in-stash stuff and wanting to pull it out and start it. (Someone needs to start a version of Ravelry for quilters, if there isn't one already).

I like rearranging my queue to reflect how I feel at the moment. I like sorting my projects. I've always been kind of that way - after Hallowe'en, I would sort my candy by type (e.g., Snickers bars vs. Milky Ways) and order it by how much I liked the type of candy. I also had a lot of those little plastic zoo animals as a child and I used to like to sort them by carnivores vs. herbivores, or by which species was related (as far as I knew) to what, and so on. I guess in some respects I'm a taxonomist at heart.

(And yes. I've taken those online Asperger's-syndrome self-identifying tests and always come up neurotypical. So I don't think I'm too far in Rain Man territory with my love of re-arranging my sockyarn.)

It's not so good because I AM slightly compulsive - I'll be working at my desk and think, oh, I need to take a break - go on Flickr and dig up an old photo of an old project and post it! Or hunt for new projects to add to my queue! Or try to track down people whose blogs I like, or who comment on my site a lot, and "friend" them.

(The grammarian in me says: "That should be "befriend." Or "make 'friends' with them.")

And of course I have to check what my friends are doing - if they've updated their blogs or if they've finished a new project.

So I do have to be pretty draconian with myself about limiting my time on there.