brian

I got my second shot this morning, not even 90 minutes ago. It was the Moderna vaccine, if you must know, and I got it at the Walgreens on Battleground Avenue. I made the first appointment over the phone, using the buttons, after the website had told me there were no available appointments.

But really, there are appointments everywhere!

I would have thought that after a deadly pandemic year and with the advent of spring, that getting a vaccine would look like soup lines during the Depression, or at least a hot sneaker release. But I was one of a small handful on the day of my first vaccine, exactly four weeks ago, and there were only three of us there this morning.

I brought my daughter to the FEMA vax site at the Greensboro Coliseum after setting an appointment online. It was easy. They are set up to process thousands upon thousands of shots per day in the Special Events Center. She was one of perhaps a couple dozen getting jabbed; one whole side of the facility was not in use, but it is absolutely ready to go.

My middle child missed an appointment for this life-saving vaccine in Boone, where App State is administering Johnson & Johnson vaccines to all comers.

Missed it! Like it was a monorail or something! I’ll just catch the next one!

But really, it looks as if we have enough for all who want them. So far, 17.6 percent of North Carolinians have been vaccinated, and that number doesn’t include me and everyone else at the Walgreens this morning.

The plan was to have 200 million vaccines out there by the beginning of April; by and large this has happened: More than 219 million doses went out there, more than 163 million administered.

Almost a third of the country has had at least one shot, if we’re believing the CDC these days, and more than 63 million, about 20 percent of the US population, are fully vaccinated.

I do not know what to do with this kind of government efficiency, this orderly national effort, this bit of socialized medicine, except perhaps remind us all of what we’re capable when things look bad and we need to enact a plan.

That and get my shots. Couple more weeks of down time, and I’ll be out there in the sunshine with everybody else.

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