Chiquita on Donating Plasma

Just like any other high school (soon to be college!) student, I've been pretty low on cash lately. Its times like these when I really, really miss waitressing. It was always very nice to walk out at the end of the night with cash in hand, not having to stretch out my paycheck to make it last from one to the next. Well, I don't get tips working at Lowe's as a cashier, obviously. Bummer, right? Yea, it sucks. I get paid very well, more than I have ever been paid before and enough to make me want to work really hard to be able to stay on after the season is over, and hopefully all the way through college. Even though I get enough money to pay the things I need to pay for as well as buy the things I want, I still seem to have trouble keeping a hold of my money through the second week. When I first started, I started having my mom spot me twenty here or twenty there just to have some spending money from paycheck to paycheck. Thankfully, all that has suddenly changed. Recently, maybe a month or so ago, Haley and I started donating at BioLife, the plasma donation place. We both scheduled our physicals at the same time the first time and we pretty much always schedule our donation appointments on the same day at the same time so we can go together. The first time was pretty sucky. At first a younger girl poked me in my right arm, but she couldn't get a good vein, so she dug around in my arm for a while with the needle while I tried not to cry, then a different employee, named Lucas, came over and dug around in there for a while before deciding to poke my other arm. They got a good vein in that one right away and I was able to donate that day. The first time they poked me it hurt super bad because I wasn't used to it, but since that day, I feel it less and less every time I go. One time I went and my machine had a faulty separator, so I was only hooked for like thirty seconds and then the machine went crazy and started beeping and someone rushed over and checked everything out. He was like "yeah, you're done for the day," I was like "What?!" and then he explained to me that it was ok, I was fine, the machine just had a faulty separator and wasn't separating my blood and plasma and was just sending my blood straight into the plasma bag. That meant that I wouldn't be able to get my blood back, so I couldn't get on a new machine. I was fine with that though, because I still got paid. I've never been not allowed to donate for any reason, although I did have to sit for five minutes because my temperature was too low one time. Other than those times, I've had no problems and its been great. I love it because I normally go on Wednesdays and Fridays, so I have money in the middle of the week when I normally dont have any cash, and Fridays when I need money to go out. Its been working out pretty great so far!