Zoe and Arta Go For their Flu Shots

December 12, 2009

Zoe and I decided Saturday was the day to get her flu shot. This was also a good day for other families, five other sections of people in the line-up for the flu clinic. The woman handing out the numbers for us to stand in line with, told us we should wander off to shop and then take our place in the line-up in 45 minutes when we would be coming close to the place to officially enter the clinic. Or, she said, “Drive down to the clinic at the Stampede Grounds. They have no line-up there.” The weather was -24 degrees. No thanks to another drive, I thought.

I had checked Zoe’s clothing to make sure her upper shoulder was accessible. She wanted to know if she had to go without food, for she has been doing other testing at the Dr.s offices, some of the tests being fasting tests.

I did not know that I could get the seasonal flu shot, so decided to double up on doing work for me too, when I was standing in the line-up. But I hadn’t designed what I was wearing for the day around me getting a shot. When I tried to get the public health nurse to go in through the crew neck on my shirt by pulling it from my neck, down over my shoulder, she said, “Oh, just pull your arm out of your sleeve and I will go in that way.” Then she hiked up my shirt over my shoulder saying, “Here, I will delicately drape you with the rest of the shirt that is left so that not too much is showing.”

I burst out laughing. "I need a lot of draping help after having had 8 children," I told her. “Delicately draped is a word I choose to use on 2nd century alabaster Greek statues."

“Oh,” she contiuned, "there is a lot of draping done here. Mostly by older men who have to take their shirts off, but don’t want anyone to notice their pot bellies.”

I had noticed some handsome older men in the line-up, but hadn’t really put my mind to the idea that even they want to do draping at the flu clinic.

Zoe’s and my Saturday adventure had taken us to Canada Trust. “I only have five dollars,” was the clue she gave me that she needed to stop in at the bank. And she was beaming when she slipped $40 more into her purse. She is better at the instant teller than me. I also go in and get a clerk to help me.

We slipped into Safeway to purchase a bag of chips and a bottle of Coke, her treat for being good, and a treat meant to accompany the crib game we were about to play when we got home.

She is getting good with the language of crib. Today she added to her cribbage lexicon the fact that four numbers in a row is called a straight run, that the cribbage board is divided up into streets of 30 points each, that the card that is turned over after each player has thrown 2 cards into the crib, is called the starter card and that the rules stipulate that you have to make three shuffles of the deck between rounds.

If you try playing Zoe a game of cribbage this season, work hard at counting all of your points before pegging. She is good at Muggins. She gets more pleasure than I wish her to have when she is able to find points in my hand after all of the counting I can do on it.