Weekend of Service

President Obama is urging each of us into community service projects. I did a little piece to start my contribution this weekend.

After my oldest son got his braces put on Saturday morning, the family and I went over to my daughter's school and spent about four hours raking, tilling, cleaning, moving, and planting plants. It made a huge difference. I think that the kids even had a little fun.

After that we came home and I mowed my neighbor's yard while my wife and the boys helped weed some out-of-control flower beds (he's been out of town for a while taking care of his sister), his neighbor's lot (it's really just an abandoned house at this point) that he used to take care of, then I came back and did lawn for the neighbor on the other side of me (they were off on a mini-vacation to Las Vegas) before finally getting my own lawn mowed.

On Sunday, I finally got in to donate at the Red Cross. When I was donating for Gary a couple of months ago, I asked what the best way for me to help was, knowing that I often got out of sync in my blood donations and ended up not donating as often as I would like. I was told, "platelets." Apparently I have a good platelet count - who knew?! :-) It's done in a similar fashion to my neutrophil donation where they take what they need out of the blood and return the rest, so it takes a little longer, but I could donate as often as once every 7 days. I won't be doing that, but it does mean that I can get in more often as my schedule allows and not have to wait for the next blood drive like I had been doing.

They went for two units, but I felt a little nauseous halfway through the second unit, so I only got one this time, but it's a start. I think I just didn't have enough food or fluids in my system this time. I'll try again in a month or so as I can get in.

The nurse was saying that (if I remember this right), platelets are like gold, plasma is like silver and whole blood is like bronze. They're all needed, but apparently the platelets can help more for some reason. Don't know. Don't care. Whatever I can do to help.

It makes me feel good when I volunteer for something. I wish I had more time, or even money, to help others, but every little bit helps. I know that they appreciate it.