How Shocking Can a Flu Shot be?

Once again, ‘tis the season and I decided I’d get my flu shots before boarding an aeroplane in Dec. I have no desire to spend my vacation ill and spreading the doom and gloom to others. So, yesterday I got myself down to the doctor’s and sat in the waiting room waiting for my turn. As it has been rather chilly, I decided I would wear my Arwen sweater, which I finished just in time for our summer heat wave. I’ve been looking forward to wearing it ever since.

As it happened, I had to wait a rather long time and while I was sitting there, I listened to a book on my iPod and contemplated the walls, the floor and finally the tweed in my sweater. Looking at the arm, I thought I spied a particularly odd ball of fluff clinging on to the sweater. I picked a bit and it seemed pretty stuck, so I took a closer look. To my utter horror, I realized that it was a dropped stitch in my beautiful, finished sweater, at which realization I broke into a cold sweat. The others in the waiting room all moved over a seat or two. Even worse than noticing the stitch was, there was absolutely nothing I could do about it, and while my doctor always likes my hand knits and admires them, I didn’t think I could waltz up to the desk and asked if they had an emergency knitting kit and spare bit of yarn. All I could do was sit there instilling fear into the other patients as I sweat blood and hoped that: firstly it would not fall down the ladder any more that it already had, secondly that I would remember to fix it asap and finally that when I did remember to fix it, I would still have a 12 inch piece of yarn to fix it with. This was the one sweater which took every bit of yarn I had to finish and I didn’t know if I’d saved the last bit of my swatch instead of tossing it.

Now, this stitch must have been dropped for months and months and months. It hadn’t gone anywhere during that time. It had only dropped down three rows before becoming stuck, so I figured that the yarn being hairy would work in my favour. My turn came, I was given said flu shot, during which said doctor admired said sweater, and then took the dog for a walk before dropping her off at home. Now, do you think I could have remembered to do a quick stitch up while I was at home? Of course not! That would have meant that my brain retained something important for a change! No, I remembered when I was back at work, where there is also a surprising dearth of emergency knitting kits.

However, all ended well. The brave little stitch clung for dear life and managed to make it until the evening. I also managed to find the rest of the swatch and darned in a fix, going through said stitch more times than strictly necessary. Now I think even if the rest of this sweater falls to tiny little bits, this one little stitch will still be there hanging on for dear life. Bless him.