When I left the neighborhood this morning at 8 AM to take Dad for cataract surgery, there was a fleet of Georgia Power trucks restricting traffic at the entrance to my neighborhood. When I passed back by the neighborhood with Dad in the car 30 minutes later, they were still there. When we came back by 4 hours later, they were still there. I made a mental note to come home by way of the neighborhood's other entrance (which is technically an entrance to the adjacent development, but we share a connecting street on the back side).

But then, on the final leg of this trip, while thinking about where I was going to turn, I drove past the dental office about a mile up the street and got to thinking about how the young hygienist I recently saw at a different dentist's office talked so much that maybe hygienist schools teach students to always be agreeable to clients and prattle to distract them from the scraping and what a funny word "prattle" is and what its etymology might be and how rarely we use the word "prattle" except in the context of hygienists who talk too much and the They Might Be Giants song "Lucky Ball & Chain" except the word repeated in the chorus of that song is actually "rattling"... and then I turned into my regular neighborhood entrance where I usually do and saw the muddy tire tracks on the road and belatedly realized that I had intended to turn elsewhere.

The good news is that the Georgia Power trucks had already left.

The bad news is that I probably shouldn't be allowed to drive a car.

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For the first time in about three decades, I saw a new dentist today.

To be clear, I have seen a dentist at least twice a year for decades; it was just always the same dentist. I started seeing him when I was going to Emory University in the 1990s, and whether I lived in Atlanta, Athens, or Newnan, I still drove to Decatur to pay cash to have Dr. Joe Looper tell me I had new cavities.

Unfortunately (for me, not Joe), he decided to retire this year. Good for him. Even though he's a Tennessee Volunteers alumnus, I hope he enjoys all the time he's going to have on his hands supporting the Vols. I'm personally disappointed, obviously, but my only regret is that he didn't give me a little more notice. He retired barely three weeks before my next scheduled appointment. With all due respect to whoever bought Joe's practice, if I have break in a new dentist, it might as well be someone I don't have to drive two hours to visit.

So today I went to the practice that my father and aunt use, and it was fine. The young hygienist (who graduated during the pandemic from a local high school [that didn't exist when I was in high school] and sort of fell into training for her mother's line of work because she couldn't attend any colleges in person but enjoys being a hygienist, especially the flossing) was friendly and gentle (even during the flossing). And the young dentist, who has a dental degree from a non-SEC school, used a newfangled dental camera to review my aging radiolucent composite fillings before encouraging me to be more attentive to my coffee-stained molars. No cavities were found, and all things considered, the price seemed reasonable enough with their in-network insurance plan.

I have another appointment scheduled for October, but I won't get too attached. After all, I'm only going to have to find a new dentist in about 2055.

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At least two houses on my street put up their Christmas decorations last weekend, a full six weeks before Christmas. What's the damn hurry to get to Christmas?

I talked about this with the dental technician at my appointment for fillings yesterday. (Yes, another appointment for fillings. In fact, part of yesterday's appointment was to fix some old fillings that were showing stains. Now even my fillings need fillings!)

The technician said she shared my opinion, and that in her opinion time passed fast enough without our hurrying it. She then proceeded to to explain that she also hated artificial Christmas trees with "built-in" lights and visiting family that overstays its welcome. It was quite a lively conversation, if a bit one-sided.

At least some other people are perturbed that Christmas seems to be coming earlier each year, I thought to myself. But no sooner had the dentist injected the lidocaine into my jaw before I overheard the following conversation in the hallway outside:

Hygenist: "Do you think that Pike Nurseries on LaVista road is a nice place?"
Voice 2: "Yes. Why do you ask?"
Hygenist: "I think it's time for a Christmas tree."

So now I've decided that decorating for Christmas is a social disease, passed from one person to another, infecting everyone along the way. Obviously, as I'm strictly opposed to the concept of seasonal decoration, I must only be a carrier for the disease, spreading it without showing any symptoms myself.

I guess that means that if you are reading this post, you should probably take the preemptive measure of squirting some Purell into your eyes, just in case. Better safe than snowy, I always say.

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The Man with the Golden Gums: in the past month, I've spent $1,439 on dental work. That's the most that I've spent on anything in a one-month span since, well, ever. I'm well on my way to being the Six Million Dollar Man, with the entire amount spent entirely on my teeth.

A Chew to a Kill: For the record, those aren't my teeth. My teeth don't look that good. Those are just some x-rays dated May 5, 1951, that I found in my late grandfather's records. They aren't his teeth, either. He was a dentist. I'm sure that if he wasn't already dead, seeing the state of my teeth would kill him.

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