Steve Allen: 'It feels strange to finally have the shot in the arm'

It feels strange after months of following the news - from original reports out of China, through the global pandemic and onto the vaccine stage - to finally have the shot in the arm.

It wasn’t without emotion. I realised that this jab that took less than a second could have saved my father’s life if it had been available a few weeks earlier. But that’s not what I do in this column when there are so many silly things I noticed while getting my shot.

Steve Allen is annoyed with people breaking lockdown rules (Image: Steve Allen)

When I got to the vaccine centre there was a queue around the building. I was annoyed until I realised that social distancing has made all queues look more impressive. If they brought out a new iPhone now they’d block off a city.

While waiting in the queue I found myself silently judging the ages of the people in the queue with me. I applied for my jab when the under 45s were included in the rollout so if anyone looked over 50 I was thinking: “Don’t rush mate. There’s only a pandemic on.”

I was secretly hoping people were doing the same to me. They would be thinking: “Why is this young man here? Are the early 30s now invited?”

Whenever someone made eye contact I would mouth the words “underlying condition” to help convince them.

Top tip. Dress for easy shoulder access. I saw someone in a onesie and hoped they didn’t hold us all up.

The jab itself was painless, but even if it wasn’t, it’s our way back from the dark times and back to having a laugh about the silly things in life again.