I have a fairly rare blood type -- O negative. We are the universal donors--we can give blood to anyone. But, we can only take our own. (Unlike the other rare blood type, AB, who can't give to anyone else but their own selfish, selfish kind, but who can take anyone's blood I might add, and I am sure do, at every opportunity. The takers!)
When I used to watch ER, I would always feel a small surge of pride knowing when in an emergency situation and one of the doctors called for a unit of O neg, that I, if I lived in Chicago, and had donated blood recently, and the patient had lived, and it wasn't a tv show, that I might have been responsible in some small way (who am I kidding, some small way! -- the total way, the whole, entire way) had been responsible for saving that fictional character's life! That's big people--really, really big. Let's face it, I'm a hero.
When you are a O neg blood donor (hero), you get a phone call the second your body is again available to donate blood. The SECOND. You're a big shot of the blood donating world; you're like a celebrity (not really, but you really should be). Some years ago I stopped donating blood for a while. Then I thought, man, I need to get back to saving the world. So I called up the Canadian Blood Donation service and let them know I was available again.
"O negative!?" the woman on the phone exclaimed, clearly delighted.
"Yes," I replied, trying to sound humble, but frankly who are we kidding.
from here
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