Friday reported on Satuday in Flash

Yesterday was my dental extravaganza. It went well. I enjoyed it in a certain sense. My dentist is a remarkable man and he has a beautiful dental office. Art and views and exquisite planning. He has pasque flowers blooming in the landscaping. It's freshly mulched, he said the spring peepers (never heard of them except as frogs) had been covered up. The tall grasses that were outside my chair view window had been cut back so they were less dramatic.

He has an absolutely beautiful piece of technology that makes crowns like a three dimensional printer prints up whatever. He root canal-ed my tooth which didn't hurt and then he filled it and built it up and shaped it to accept the crown. Then he used a little camera like a thick ball point pen to photo the prepared tooth and its neighbors. That information goes into a little computer on wheels that was at my right elbow. I got to watch. There was the three dimensional image from my mouth. Ordinarily that would scare the heck out of me. My mouth is not a fun place. But this was fascinating.

He designed the crown - modified it so it would be what he wanted for me, what would work best. Then he sent the info to a mill in another room - I probably could have gone to look at that but I didn't - that formed the crown from a block of magic porcelain. He came back with this little white piece of mouth jewelry and glued it in.

The technology is from Germany. It was interesting to see such a practical magic. We are used to doing anything/everything on the computer but it's not tactile or even physically helpful. This is. Of course it cost a pretty penny but what's money for if not for exciting experiences.

The whole thing took a little more than two hours and I got to read about George Clooney's fiance and the Sherpa climbers families and see Brad Pitt's newest awful haircut. I went to the bathroom at one point and saw this really nice poster about sunflowers. I've got to plant some sunflowers this year.

After the dentist I went to the hospital to have a wellness blood test. I paid much much less money to have a sample of my blood tested for a whole bunch of things. The results should be in Monday's mail. They have you address an envelope to yourself so you know you'll get it. They provide the stamp.

I did it two years ago and I'm interested in seeing if my numbers are better or worse or different. I'm two years older. I'm one year off wheat and sugar. We will see. Two years ago my numbers were good. I plan to take both reports when I finally get around to my Welcome To Medicare physical later this year.

Then I went to Walmart. It was the Walmart where I worked those few weeks in December. It feels funny to be there. I used to shop there a lot when I was at my printing job which was only a mile or so away. Now I go to work in the opposite direction and it's more common for me to go in the opposite direction. Walmarts are all pretty much the same - not exactly though. They have so much of everything. That was part of joy/not of overnight stocking. You had to find where things went and you had to see if there was room for a whole box of whatever it was. If not you sent it back. It was a challenging job.

But yesterday I was shopping. I bought a new pedometer and a new walking radio and big envelopes - I had to mail my state taxes in a little one - and faux Claritin. I bought groceries including stuff to make taco dip (again!) for Monday's Cinco de Mayo celebration at work.

I bought a pineapple. Someone said on Facebook that pineapples are now mostly GMO (genetically modified). I was wondering why they were so available, so cheap and so good. Pineapples used to be rare luxuries and they were iffy quality-wise. I got in a fight on FB saying that so I suppose I'll get in a fight here too.

After Walmart I drove the scenic way - past my old employer - I noted my old walking route again - saw the house with all the gopher mounds in the lawn - looks better this year.

In town I took the Springsteen bio back to the library and stopped at German Farmers to pay property insurance. That's a sizable check too and was up a bit due to something being changed. I also stopped at Casey's for half a tank of gas and two sandwiches. Gracie got the croissant, I got the chicken salad.

All in all it was an expensive day - not sure I ever spent that much in one day without owning something that I hadn't owned before.

The rest of the day I kind of wrote off. I read and napped and did a bit of laundry. Weather is still gray and cold. Another late spring. I hope this year is better for the farmers.

Here's another picture of the pasque flower.