Last week I had a couple of COVID symptoms. I had some nausea and even though I had slept seven or eight hours the previous night, by mid-afternoon I was completely exhausted. Now, the list of symptoms is pretty common, so I think most people are likely to get at least a couple at once at some point. So after all this time I finally had two of the symptoms and so I thought I would play it safe and get tested.

First I had to schedule a test. In the early days, these were not readily available, but now they are everywhere, just like the vaccines. I went to Walgreens.com and entered all my info, insurance-wise, and the other things they need to know like have you had COVID before, etc. And of course, you put in your email address.

I set it up on Tuesday and was able to get an appointment at 11:45 am on Thursday.

Day of the test, I just drove up to the regular pharmacy drive-through window. They checked my ID, and gave me a clear plastic bag with a couple of papers and the testing swab and vial. The papers were just the usual privacy statement and the permissions. And I got a free pen! I followed the instructions they gave me there. I unwrapped the swab, ran the swab around in my nostrils, put the whole thing in the vial, and closed it. The vial has liquid in it. I gave it back to the pharmacy tech and that was it.

It’s pretty easy to get tested as you can see, and I didn’t have to pay anything out of pocket, but since I have insurance, they will charge my insurance.

I got the result via email on Sunday night at about 10 pm. Negative! Obviously, this is pretty important, so they are working around the clock on this thing, and it’s all done by a contract company, not Walgreens or the government.
So if you have symptoms, get tested!