Gonna give blood tomorrow. The Red Cross is fond of telling me how much the babies like my O-. I like babies, so I try to help them out when I am able. It seems I’m gonna get an Amazon gift card out of the deal, too.
I’m a little leery about giving blood this year as we are running so many races, and there really is no downtime, but I’m gonna give it a whirl. My experience is that it takes me about five days to get my running stamina back, so hopefully, by next week’s long run, I’ll be right as rain.
Of course, I am going to have to accept the poorer performances in the other runs next week, which is not an insignificant process for me. I’m still working on the Running Log spreadsheet, and it is going to be tricky for me to accept seeing the numbers go down. So much so, in fact, that there is a non-zero chance that I will push too hard Tue-Thur next week.
But this is the week to figure these things out. I still won’t have started the new job, so if I feel okay, it won’t affect my job performance. Ideally, I find that it’s all possible, and it will just come down to being able to schedule appropriately going forward.
I first donated back in high school, some school-sponsored blood drive or something. The phlebotomists love the oversized veins in my arms. The time of the actual donation is usually about seven minutes or so. I spend more time getting my vitals taken than anything else.
Speaking of vitals, I’ve been deferred in the past a couple different times. Seems my pulse can be too low. The requirement is that the donor’s pulse needs to be above fifty; I don’t always reach that threshold. So, I try to be a little bouncy on my way into the screener. Ironic that the fitter I get, the less likely I am to be able to give blood.
The same thing happened back when I used to sell my plasma. But that’s a story for another day.
Are you a blood donor?