Get your vaccine sooner using this one weird trick!

A slightly younger neighbor than I, who is not quite old enough to be in the eligible cohort, said she went to a mass-vaccination site on Super Bowl Sunday to see if they could take her because of possible no-shows. She said she was given her shot within minutes.

But that's not a very useful trick, since waiting until next Super Bowl Sunday may not sound all that great.

But here is what I would recommend to everyone eager to get theirs. If you are near a mass-vaccination site, go down and just talk to the people working there. I did that, talked to the workers who were almost all Army enlisted, and while they said they couldn't squeeze me in, they recommended that I go on the official website and set an appointment. When I pointed out to them that I was a few years shy of the qualifying age, they said it wasn't a problem.

So I went to the scheduling website, put my honest date of birth down, showed up, and voila, I got stuck a couple of days ago. Otherwise, I probably would have been waiting weeks. So just go down there and talk with them. YMMV, but that's the one weird trick.

We have a mass vaccination site open in Portland, but because the federal government choked off the vaccine distribution back in January (when Trump was still in power), we still have only received about 40% of the doses we were promised. Thus, the governor has shifted priorities to healthcare workers, teachers, and people age 80 or older (in that order). It's going to be quite a while before the ordinary folk are able to get in line. As of now, you can only sign up if you're in one of the abovementioned groups.

I no longer think this was just incompetence. I think that Trump choked off the distribution of the vaccine to states that didn't vote for him. He might not have realized that the very people who will die because they won't get the vaccine in time are the same people who held mini-MAGA hate rallies all summer and fall and voted for the Orange Thing in November. The people of Oregon now have yet another reason to hate Trump and the RepubliQ party.

Can I suggest that we consider the truth.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/health/covid-vaccine-states-distribution-doses/

Your point?

In Oregon, we've received far fewer vaccine doses than we were promised. The Post article says nothing about that. It does note that we are 49th in cases per capita, which is due to the fact that we have relatively few Trump-worshipping no-maskers, and that the more populated counties have been quickly locked down when cases spiked, even as MAGA morons marched in the streets and screamed for the governor to be executed.

As I said, I can only guess why we haven't gotten the vaccine doses that we were promised, but I doubt that it's just a simple Trump botch. We are already well aware that Trump always channeled federal disaster aid toward those places that supported him and away from those that didn't. (Remember when Texas got billions in hurricane relief and Puerto Rico got paper towels?)

The Biden administration is trying to fix vaccine distribution, but that's just one more mess that is having to be un-Trumped and will take time to solve.

Kevin tells us that his state isn't getting their fair share of vaccines.  I provide proof that Oregon is getting their fair share, and he asks "Your point?".

Kevin tells us that Trump screwed up distribution and because of this isn't giving out the doses promised.  Before coming to such a conclusion, one might first read about how many doses of vaccines are being distributed world wide, and what share the US is getting.  Kevin, is it Trumps fault that no producer is producing as many vaccine doses that they first promised?

Does Kevin believe that Trump should be credited with getting the US more than our fair share?

The good news is the end is in sight.    I have bittersweet feelings about it.   I'm glad the virus will be conquered...but I'm not looking forward to going back to the office.  I've really got used to this whole "work at home" thing.   

My alarm clcok has been turned off since last March and I'm  saving a ton of money.    I have bacon and eggs for breakfast every day and its cheaper than my old habit of getting a bagel and coffee at Panera  on the way to work.    Same dynamic  with lunch.      

Boiler, if you want to serve as Trump's white knight, that's your problem.

You provided NO proof that Oregon is getting its "fair share," simply because you did no research to find out what that "fair share" was or is. Therefore, your statement is meaningless.

It's very simple to find that out, though. When the first two vaccines were approved, the federal government promised a given number of doses over a given timetable. Based on those promises, Oregon authorities set up a vaccine prioritization system: healthcare and other essential workers, people 65 or older, then the rest of the population. Then, only 40% of what was promised arrived. The shortfall in vaccines means that now, only people 80 or older are being vaccinated.

The Biden administration is slowly fixing this Trump screwup, which is why the numbers look relatively OK now. But if not for Trump, we'd be able to vaccinate all seniors at this point, and begin vaccinating the general population in mid-April.

Trump botched all this. Trump didn't give a shit. Trump didn't do his job. Trump has killed tens of thousands of people who would have survived had we not had an incompetent narcissist in office. You may continue to worship him if you choose.

I can't fathom the many angles involved in production, distribution, and administration of  the vaccine.   Glad I'm not sitting where the buck stops, if there is such a thing.  Kevin wants to blame Trump for everything but...I can't buy it.  Just like I can't buy that that Biden will fix everything much quicker.   It is a process, from the beginning, never without road bumps, and processes have to be tweaked before they are perfect, if ever.   Thank God for the progress so far, which could have been years instead of months.

My state is doing pretty well, but has yet to administer the number of doses received thus far by a third or so, for various reasons.  I'm pretty sure we didn't get the number that was initally applied for, or promised, but now we have more than can be given in time to report...report being a big deal in itself, because reporting all depends on who what when and where.  They have (at least) three days to report administration statistics, the ones that make the daily newspaper and UTube and Facebook and so on and so forth.

Ah, nevermind.

Candy

Well, Candy, you're sounding very Republican today. I don't "blame Trump for everything." I never said that; don't put words in my mouth a la Boiler. I blame Trump for his incompetence and callous indifference. Would people still have gotten sick and died with a better President? Absolutely! What I blame Trump for is the difference between the outcome we could have had and the outcome we actually got. Clear?

The reason why Biden is dramatically improving vaccine distribution isn't due to some miracle. He's just doing commonsense things that should have been done months ago, like nationalizing the production and allocation of vaccine doses. He's set up nationwide regional distribution centers. He's funneled more money to producers of things like vials and needles.

Trump knew all this--or at least he was being advised to that effect. He closed his eyes to the problem, ran away to scratch his fat orange ass on the golf course every weekend, and spent all of his energy on bleating about the election. All this while thousands of people died every day--and he did nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Well, it's going to be October before we're out of the woods--or maybe December, if the anti-vaxxers are as numerous as it seems. So it's gonna be home office for quite some time yet. I believe, though, that some individuals and many companies are NOT going to go back to the way things were, ever.

The truth of the matter is that most office jobs don't require your physical presence in the office. You can do the same work anywhere that has a computer and a good internet connection. We should have started moving away from the "commute to the city" model twenty years ago. We no longer need to crowd the freeways twice a day with miserable wage slaves. If people stay home, they're more productive overall than if they spend ten hours a week behind the wheel.

This has been obvious for some time. But because rich old white men run companies, we do things the old-fashioned way. And the old-fashioned POV is that people won't produce if they're allowed to stay home--they'll supposedly goof off. Like the Republican party and Trumpism, this old white guy narrative is specious, outmoded, outdated, and obsolete.

I think that a whole lot of people will realize just how much easier and better their lives became when they no longer had to put on the monkey suit and dutifully report to their cubicles, and they won't want to give that up. That would be a vast improvement for everyone and the companies they work for.