Cover the Uninsured

12: The number of people who applied for medical benefits at Cover the Uninsured.

I'm happy to report that I am in a much better mood this week than I was last week. For one thing, the spyware that had infected my computer is completely gone, thanks to our IT person in Columbus, Rebekah Moser. You have no idea what a relief it is not having to close those tiny warning boxes every five minutes.

Also, this is just a four-day week for me. My boyfriend, Kyle, is buying a condo and is going to start moving in this Friday. Yay! I took the day off so I could help him out.

AND, while working on a Saturday is never really a fun time, participating in Cover the Uninsured this weekend was not as bad as I thought it would be. I had fully expected to arrive only to have no idea what I was doing. I had planned to follow the lead of whoever was sitting next to me. But by the end of the day, the other volunteers were looking at me whenever our customers had questions.

The event lasted from about 9 a.m. to noon. We (me and two other volunteers) had a table set up near the pharmacy at the Kroger in Forest Park, equipped with applications for programs like food stamps, prescription assistance and Healthy Start. We had a pretty good stream of people coming through all day, and we ended up filling out applications for a dozen people.

I was starting to feel pretty good about myself when I was able to answer questions that no one else had an answer for. The one really frustrating part of it was not being able to use the Benefit Bank. It would have made the whole process so much easier. It was difficult hearing people say how redundant and confusing the applications were without giving everyone a pitch about why they should just come to Shared Harvest on Monday to use the Benefit Bank.

Okay, I even handed out a few business cards.

Anywho, it was a lot better than I thought it would be. At least my experience went a lot better than Kaitlyn's did.