Monday, May 18, 2020

Afrontery


Angus receives an e-mail from his dentist in London


Thank you for bearing with us during recent times when we have only been allowed to offer a telephone triage service and no proper emergency dental care. 
Our absolute priority is to keep you safe and for you to feel comfortable returning to the practice.
There will be certain changes to your dental visits, to maintain social distancing and to minimise contact with others. In the surgery we will be wearing PPE appropriate to the procedure that you are having done.  We sincerely hope that you do not find this unnecessarily intimidating.
Angus can't help but wonder what a 'telephone triage service ' is and what 'no proper emergency dental care' means. It goes without saying that Angus's troublesome lower left wisdom tooth also starts to 'twinge' as soon as he's read the email. Can this be psychological or just bad timing ? Reading between the lines it seems as though the backlog of treatments will swamp the surgery for the next 12 months. The same probably true for hospitals. Of course there are those who believe that after November 3rd the virus will mysteriously disappear.


The dragon flies are out in force today. Dozens of lapis lazuli darts of light hovering above the waterfall. They are close enough for Sophie to notice but small enough to be ignored. They certainly don't warrant a bark.


The same cannot be said for the farmers dog who has had the sheer afrontery to wander over and say hello. The farmer is putting out scarecrows. There are ten of them strung along the valley. All white bin liners, tapered at the waist and with red heads made from the local bakers plastic carrier bags. This is ever so faintly creepy as in ' if you go down to the valley at night you'll find there's a party going on' type of way. A 2/10 on the spooky scale. The farmers dog wants to play with Sophie but scoots away when the farmer calls. 


This is a morning when Sophie looks at the ramp as if its the first time she's ever seen it in her life.


Big things happen in May :  https://twitter.com/KevinMKruse/status/1262014295128395776/photo/1

That happened quickly :https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/gktyu0/oc_covid19_confirmed_cases_bar_chart_race/


13 comments:

WFT Nobby said...

Handsome farmers dog.
The easing of lockdowns is slowly bringing home how much more complicated and, frankly less enjoyable, so many aspects of life will be, at least in the near-medium term. (Not that going to the dentist was ever enjoyable!)
Hope the various twinges settle down.
Cheers, Gail.

Tigger's Mum said...

Ohhhh dragonflies - magical.

Taste of France said...

If you need a dentist and/or dental surgeon, I can recommend mine. An hour's drive the other side of TLS but quicker than flying to the UK (and you'd need a permission slip to go farther than 100 km). My husband had dental surgery with our former dentist, who now does only surgery, and that dentist's colleague, who has been our regular dentist for about a decade now, removed four of our kid's teeth for braces and also gave me a surprisingly painless root canal. As for triage, one day when I was there, the secretary was complaining about a patient who called for an emergency appointment and when told a time to come the patient responded that it wasn't convenient! The secretary said that if it was an emergency, then you don't negotiate the scheduling!
Seriously, just email me if you need the dentist's details. taste (dot) france (at) yahoo (dot) com.

Angus said...

Thank you. I may take you up on that. I'm being a bad tempered bear ( not my words ) and will suffer for 48 hours to see if it goes of its own accord !

Poppy Q said...

We had no new Covid cases here in NZ today again, with only 2 patients with Covid in hospital and 96% of patients recovered. We can return now to our normal drs and dentists appointments. Our hospital is almost reopened, and we are working on clearing the backlog of procedures and scans. I cannot imagine how it must be for badly affected hospitals in Europe, the UK and the US.

Toothache is the worst!!

Angus said...

My worry is the arrival of the cold an flu season at the end of the summer. People seem to be forgetting 'distancing' and mask wearing already. This afternoon I'll be going down to the big city ( Toulouse ) and it will be interesting seeing what folks are doing there.

Angus said...

I fear that Union Street is going to look somewhat the worse for wear after this - not that internet shopping had done it any favours.

Angus said...

Indeed - particulalry en masse.

Yamini MacLean said...

Hari OM
Dental triage was required for my father. He was complaining of nerve pain in the one remaining molar (to which his 'plate' achors) and then of the few remaining lower front teeth, two broke. I knew enough to get the Ibuprofen ramped up and mouth wash going and when we rang the dentist only confirmed what I had done, but advised a stricter dosing. We rang again a week later as he was really in significant discomfort, but they are truly hampered from operations. His dentist said that he'd put dad on his emergency wait list and would call as when they were opened up again. That is looking rather distant a time, here in Scotland. YAM xx

Sheila said...

NPR is recalling that on this day 40 years ago Mount St. Helen's erupted. Those same people who are saying that the coronavirus and its threats will disappear on November 3 are accusing Joe Biden of being a pedophile. They're sounding increasingly desperate.

Camille said...

My dentist retired in late February and sold the practice to a bright young man just in time for his newly acquired practice to be shut down by Covid19 two weeks later. Talk about bad luck. I've been called in this week to attend my now (several times) rescheduled appointment for a routine check up and cleaning. So I'll finally meet the new fellow, but certainly will not get a good look at him as he'll be in full protective hazmat regalia. The Covid19 link is shockingly fascinating and deeply disturbing. Will the problem magically disappear on November 3rd? Pffffft, I think not. Eric is such a "trump".

~Kim at Golden Pines~ said...

We've been doing "telephone triage" in our dental office since about mid-March. The doctor calls the patient and they do a "zoom" meeting or facetime - And the patients have even taken a picture and he's looked at that too. It's how we've decided about putting patients off, or having them come in. Interestingly enough, wisdom teeth have been an issue. I'd suggest warm salt water rinses, or rinses with listerine along with motrin for discomfort until you can have it looked at.

Also, a "memory" popped up on facebook today when I had told Lynn at Rocky Creek Scotties about the loss of your beloved Wilf, 8 years ago.

Angus said...

Thank yo. It's 1.46 am here and I'm diluting some oil of Cloves. If it wasn't for the fact that the UK is about to institute 14 days quarantine and there are no flights operating this would be easy. I shall try rinsing and motrin - Thanks. Th good thing is the other twinges seem to be letting the wisdom tooth make all the running ! And yes, it is 8 years.