That's never happened before

I may have mentioned in a previous post that I'd been afraid of donating blood for much of my life.  It was a fear that I did not overcome until my mid-30's.  My friend John and I finally manned up and went and since we managed to get through the first one without passing out, donating blood has become a habit.  It's become such a habit that the staff at the place where I donate seem to know me.  It's not like they yell out my name when I walk in, but they sure know I'm the guy with the long list of foreign country deferrals.

So it was no different when I walked in this morning to do my first donation of the year.  Same friendly people.  I was done in less than forty minutes.  I felt good, as I typically do and I heeded the instructions to not overexert shovel the snow myself today.

Later in the day, I started craving something to eat and initially I could not put my finger on it.  And then it hit me - I wanted meat, red meat.  In. the. worst. way.  While my house is hardly vegetarian, you're not going to find a side of beef in the freezer either.  This lack of red meat sent me spinning.  I could not shake the desire to tear into a steak or a really good burger.  This yearning was literally gnawing at me.  Suddenly, all I could here was the old tagline, "Beef.  It's what's for dinner!" rattle around in my head.  I found myself pacing in between the two refrigerator/freezers that we have in search of anything.  My search came up empty.

So to sate my hunger, I jumped in the car and went for a mediocre burger from a local place just down the street.  Did it do the trick?  I am pleased to say that it did.  But what brought this on?  And was I out of my mind for a craving like that?  If this ad is to be believed, the answer would be no:

Indeed, I was right!

I can only attribute it to the blood donation.  Maybe it triggered some kind of wacky need to replace iron.  And maybe it could only be found in a slab o'beef.  Anyway, meat crisis averted.  Whew!