Frazz by Jef Mallett for March 01, 2020

Blood donation is awesome. The first kind of organ donation (minus the “organ” part, I guess).

The Red Cross loves me—I switched to triple platelets after I got my 5 gallon pin, and I reached the 200 donation mark last year. And to think it all began when I got a motorcycle at 17 and wanted to make sure there was something in the blood bank in case I needed it back.

Feel free to roll up your sleeve and match me for a pint. The more, the merrier.

If something’s worth doing at all, it’s worth giving 100%. Unless you’re donating blood.

That ‘liquid gold’ part refers to the current price of maple syrup.

I’ve seen the more modern maple syrup farms where they don’t use buckets. They have a network of hoses hooked up to all of the taps. Makes collection a lot easier.

My Dad (age 90) has donated blood every 60 days since 1966. Total is well over 70 gallons now. A tribute to a life of dedicated service – and strict adherence to a schedule.

I donate frequently. Started in High School and while I’ve paused a few times I haven’t stopped.

It took the 9/11 attacks to get me over my hatred of needles. I never enjoy the donation part but the folks who work the drives are awesome and have great senses of humor. It is also nice to donate something to people whose need is undeniably real.

I actually enjoy donating. Don’t mind the needle in the arm near as much as the finger poke for iron testing, and I like it if there’s a bit of a wait so I can deep-breathe my blood pressure down. The apheresis “double-red” donation is kind of interesting though if the local bloodmobile is set up to just fill a pint bag, that’s what I’ll do.Friend of mine donates platelets once a week ("You had me at ‘helping little kids with cancer,’ is what he said) but he lives a few blocks from a Red Cross blood center and “What else do I have to do on a Saturday morning?” is how he puts it.Anyway, I sent him the link to this strip because it made me think of him, so thanks for that.

Net week I will be donating my 24th quart. I’m joining the three gallon club

Donate platelets almost every month. 50 gallons and counting.

I had Hep A (food or water borne) 49 years ago—but I was over 11. That’s what I was told when I tried to donate. I suggested having my blood tested and then getting authorization (in print.) Nope, I was over 11 when I had Hep, so, I was told, the FDA banned me. Well, dammit, I tried—several times.

A platelet donation does look like liquid gold.

The real problem is not those that would donate but can’t. The problem is that out of about 30% of the population that is eligible to donate, only about 8% do.

I’m up to some 13+ gallons now. A little at a time.

Does this kid have a family?

kid derived a good thought from a totally different lesson

I hit 8 gallons this past year. It’s a feel-good thing to do.

real story. Years ago I was donated blood and 1/2 hour into donating, the nurse came up and said they couldn’t use my blood because I had some shots for traveling overseas (I had told them previously) anyways,without thinking,I said “so I’ve given this vein?”

My school friend had a maple in his front yard so we tried to make our own. We were sicker than dogs.

Started out giving whole blood, then the Red Cross center suggested giving platelets since I had a ridiculousness high count. This involved a needle in both arms, one for out the other in. Did that for a while, till my veins got a little to much love, so to speak. (they are also deep and hard to find the right size) My last session the poor tech had to sit there holding the needle in my left (the return side)arm. It took over an hour. About that time I got a job closer to home and stopped going. Will still do local dives.

Apherisis every two weeks, triple product. Big fat veins that lay there and say “poke me”, nurses love me.

Hockey players give blood,on a regular basis ;)

My American Red Cross donation center recently got Roku sticks so now you can binge watch Netflix or Amazon Prime shows/movies while sitting for platelet donation. It is indeed a time commitment between getting to a Red Cross center, the intake prep and the actual donation. But what is in your body can be of great benefit to others with big health challenges. From Google: “Platelets are used for cancer, trauma, burn and surgery patients to assist with blood clotting and stop internal and external bleeding.” And the comic is correct that platelet donations can occur every seven days due to quick regeneration.

If people didn’t donate blood, my youngest son would not have seen his 21st birthday (he’s now 34 with a son of his own).

Of course, that’s moot, because if people didn’t donate blood, he wouldn’t exist, as I wouldn’t have seen my 20th (as of today, one month shy of 64, with 3 sons).

If you do not have a valid medical reason not to donate, and still don’t, you are quite simply a Bad Person.

Just looked up some statistics. You can get about 20 gallons of sap from a maple tree per season. It takes about 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup.

You have a lot of readers in the American Red Cross Platelet Donors’ Facebook group that LOVE this strip! Bravo! Thank you so much for the shout out!

That kid’s level of empathy is really quite touching.

Thank you to everyone who gives blood!

Blood donors saved my life in ‘09. Platelet donors saved my daughter’s life two years later. To every donor out there, thank you thank you thank you more than I can ever begin to say.

Nice sentiment, kid. Hopefully you still feel that way when you’re old enough to donate.

I’m donating platelets in just a few days!

That kid has strange logic, but then again so does the writer.

Only 3% of US population gives whole blood although 33% probably can. Platelet donors are far more rare. There are just 6400+ people that have given 18 or more times in 2019. The American Red Cross Platelet Donors facebook group loves this mention of their mission. It takes an amazing amount of time to provide the material for the platelets used in leukemia and other cancer treatments as well as accidents. I dropped off a double this morning (It takes me 2 hours immobilized with needles in both arms, but it is worth every minute).

In about 10 weeks I’ll have donated 10 gallons of whole blood. My daughter, who has fibromyalgia and feels all pain about 10 times worse than people without fibro finished her 3rd gallon a few months ago and is working on her fourth. My son has diabetes and is working on his second gallon. The people at our local blood bank laugh because we all go in to donate at the same time and have competitions to see whose iron is the highest and who donates fastest. Our blood bank gives us a call and tells us when and where our blood was used. I once got a call that said that my blood was used to save the lives of newborn twins. Anyone else get goosebumps at that thought?

I donate platelets several times a year. I was thinking of blood product donations all through this strip – he hit it dead on!

As a platelet donor, I loved this comic! Thanks for bringing awareness to platelet donation and keep up the good work!

Jef Mallett’s Blog Posts

18 hrs · Jay is a real person, and our friendship is older, probably, than some of the trees he taps up there in the Upper Peninsula. Which oddly makes it even harder to give him a cameo in a strip that seems at all sufficient, but that’s what I was tasked to do. I donated the appearance to be auctioned off at my brother’s concert-series fundraiser, and it was purchased on Jay’s behalf. How do you squeeze some fifty-odd years of friendship, or fifty years of odd friendship, into a brief Sunday episode without going all sappy? Well. Maybe you just lean into it. Posts

I love this one extra! Let’s all who can go donate!

I tried twice, once when I was in college, and once at about age 40. Both times I was OK for a few donations, but then the next time I was sick for a week. I also tried giving plasma, but they gave it up because they were getting hardly anything.