My sister is flying in from California for Christmas and she’s recovering from lung surgery, so you could definitely put her in the “underlying conditions” crowd. So that meant I was going to have at it again and get my booster. I was hoping for one of those famed “my arm hurt a little bit”. Surely, after my nasty reaction to the first two, I was due an easy one.

At first, it seemed I was well on my way. Unfortunately, the wheels fell off around 1:30 in the morning. I woke up in pain, not as bad as my second shot and nowhere near as bad as my first jab that had me in bed for the better part of a week (I was in really bad shape for five days, normal took seven on the first shot).

So, here I am, eighteen hours post booster and I feel like I would after I rode a century… a little under the weather… only without the pleasure of, you know, riding my bike. That sums it up pretty well, though. I headed home from the office early and went straight to bed after I walked in the door. I slept it off. Ish.

I’ve learned a couple of things about how to feel better through the midst of the vaccine flu. First, there really is something to staying hydrated. Lots of good, old-fashioned H2O. Second, Coca-Cola. It’s a miracle elixir. Not a lot of that, because we don’t need the extra calories. Third, AdviNol or TyleVil (Advil and Tylenol together). They say to lay off the ibuprofen, but Tylenol wouldn’t touch the pain I was going through. I lived with it for the first six hours, but after that, I cranked out the mix and and feeling almost human. Finally, I feel better if I stay warm so I’m not battling the shivers. Other than that, my first shot gave me a terrible reaction for the better part of a week. The second lasted 31 hours. I felt like I was on track to beat that with the booster. And I did. Barely. By about three hours.

At precisely 5:02 yesterday afternoon, I could feel the pain leave. You know when pain hits and it feels like a tidal wave? Well, this wasn’t that. It gently ebbed and receded. Which was quite fortunate, because I was on my way to Friday night bowling. I started rolling just before six and I was mowing them down. It took a minute to get warmed up but I rolled a 198 for my first game. The second started slow with a couple of open frames but I found my groove again and finished with a 193.

Sadly, I ran out of gas two balls into the last game. It was instant, too. I dropped all the way to a 139 for my last game. I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn.

Once I got some sleep, though, I straightened right out. I’m a little out of sorts this morning, but not enough it matters. I’ll sleep it off one more day and I should be great.

And I almost forgot! The best part is once all of that funk clears up, I feel freaking amazingly good. Shockingly good. 👍