And…I’m great. Still feel it a bit at the injection site if I raise my left arm above my head, but other than that, really no after-effects it seems. Stayed up late and watched the Padres whomp up on the Cardinals last night and didn’t fall asleep on the couch. (Helped that it was done by a bit past midnight rather than running to 2AM.) My brother’s reaction was almost the same – he had a bit of a headache yesterday afternoon, and that was it.

I am glad they came out and said that the level of feeling like crap after the shots does not actually correspond to your actual immune response to the vaccine. Because, honestly – leading up to this I wasn’t sure which I was more worried about – a big response that had me flat on my ass, or no response at all.

I’m still very tweaked about the state dropping the mask mandates when we don’t even have 38% of the state fully vaccinated, but it is what it is. I can only hope the Governor’s office sees something in the data that I can’t. But I suspect we’re getting thrown under the bus for capitalism, because let’s be honest – 9 times out of 10, that’s driving everything.

They keep crowing about “over 60% of adults have had their first shot” – but over 20% of the population is under 18 – so we’re really only looking at just shy of 45% of *all* Virginians having their first shot – and we need to talk about the *whole* population when it comes to Covid & vaccines, not just adults.

I’m also annoyed at businesses who are dropping mask requirements for vaccinated customers and going on the honor system – but I also get it. These are places that have already been dealing with customers becoming violent over state-required mask mandates – if they don’t even have the state backing them up anymore on that…well, I can understand it. And if folks were getting violent over the masks, they’ll also get violent if they’re asked if they’re vaccinated.

But it’s just such an indictment of American society. We could have all said right from the start, “Of course I will do what I can to protect others. Putting on a mask is easy. I will do my part.” But, while lots of people did – so many didn’t. I will never understand how you can have so little care for others. It’s really destroyed my trust in others, which sucks.

Where I live, compliance with the mask mandates has been exceptionally high. I don’t know how much has been “Yes, of course, why wouldn’t I?” vs “Ugh, fine, whatever, but I won’t do it a second longer than I have to.” Guess we’ll be finding that out soon enough.

It’s going to be interesting to see how many folks around here start dropping masks.

I don’t know what my reaction is going to be when I start seeing the faces of strangers again. I will be hoping against hope that the face goes with a fully vaccinated body.

And as I continue to see folks with masks, I’m going to assume you’re not fully vaccinated yet and actually give a shit about your health and others (thank you!) or you’re fully vaccinated and a bit “ehhhhhh” about things at the moment. And that’s OK! I know even though I’ll be stepping a bit outside my comfort zone once I hit the magic two weeks, I’ll still be all masked up for it for a while.

And as always, if your mask is very cool or pretty – I am totally going to say something about that.

And to every pundit out there saying that vaccinated folks should just chuck all their masks and get over it – STFU and GTFOH. I’m sorry you haven’t been able to take a simple safety protocol and turn it into a lovely fashion accessory like many of us have.