Seriously, you can’t make this shyte up. I just had to share the craziness of how Mercury remains well at work in my life.

 

This is an episode of yesterday’s visit to the dentist. It demonstrates how communications get misconstrued, change comes suddenly, and the usual surprise of something that is going to cost money. I’ll give a little backstory to the lead up.

 

Me and my husband have gone to the same dentist for twenty years. When we first found Dr. B, it was while we were living in our condo and Dr. B was newly opening up shop a mere 5 minutes from our home. She’d sent out flyers to the neighborhood to promote herself and gather new business. This worked out great for me as my long-time dentist had recently announced he was retiring, and hub had a dentist far away he didn’t care for. Through the years we moved several times and some of our homes had us living a good 45 minute drive from Dr. B’s cozy office, but we kept the same dentist. When we moved to where we live now, we were back to a 5 minute convenient drive.

Throughout the years I’ve made friends with new hygenists coming and going as well as receptionists. But Marcy was a constant throughout the years, Marcy was always part-time, Saturdays, and very efficient. Going to the dentist for me was a social event chatting with the girls, including Dr. B and often staying way longer after my appointment finished, for chats.

We go to the dentist every 3-4 months, and at my previous appointment I booked for the next appointment which was to be for June. Nancy was the receptionist there for years and very efficient at reminder calls and rescheduling and so forth. But two weeks before my booked appointment in June, it wasn’t Nancy, but part-time Marcy who called midweek to inform me that Dr. B. was moving her office in July, so she was calling to tell me about the relocation. Apparently, the kerfuffle began a month after my previous appointment in March. So in April Dr.B was informed by her lessor that the medical complex had been sold so everyone in the plaza was getting booted with 3 months notice.

Me and Neem (my hygenist and friend) surmise Dr. B knew it was coming because conveniently she’d bought herself her own building over a year ago and built a new very mode dentist practice, knowing the boot would eventually happen because real estate in Toronto here is very precious and stores and plazas are being torn down left and right to put up more condos. Condos, condos, condos!

But I digress, so anyhoo, Marcy gave me the scoop and I questioned why she was there during the week instead of Nancy, and apparently there was some unpleasantries taken place between Nancy and Dr. B about the relocating notice. Marcy told me she was now working a few days a week plus her standard Saturdays. And so I asked her where the new place was located.

I will mention that Nancy and Marcy both live close enough to walk to work. Marcy gave me the address of the new location, which I knew the area well because it was 2 minutes from my dad’s old family business. But I also knew the area was an industrial area and across from the University so it was a traffic cored area. Not thrilled to say the least after being so conveniently located for years, I weighed out the facts, remembering she’s a great dentist and the girls who work there are always great, so decided we’d try it out and see how we felt about the new location, so I made the appointment, a double for both hub and myself since it was no longer conveniently located, which previously permitted us to go separately when it best fit our own calendar, plus I knew hub would definitely get lost going their on his own the first time. So Marcy booked hub with Neem and Dr. B would clean my teeth at the same time. But, that’s not how it all actually turned out.

A day after I make the new appointments with Marcy, I get a letter in the mail announcing Dr. B is closing the office because the building has been sold, and asking that we let her know if we want our dentistry records sent to another recommended dentist office with 4 dentists right in the plaza of the condo we first lived in – again a 5 minute drive to where I live now, and virtually, a 2 minute walk from where Nancy and Marcy live, or we should call her new office building for booking future appointments.

Now I knew my June appointment was moved just the day before to the new locale so I didn’t pay the letter any mind till I looked at it again yesterday to get the phone number from to add to my phone because the email I received the day before confirming our appointments from Marcy, left directions, and after the labyrinth we’d go through we were instructed to park in a particular area, and call her, then she’d come outside to give us a parking pass and proceed to show us where we were to park. I will mention, it was 34 degrees celcius, more like 40 with the humidity.

Well, I left hub in the car to meet Marcy halfway, and instead of standing in the heat, proceeded to walk into the office. She was still busy at her desk. A family of 3 walked out as I entered and commented, this set up of parking and coming from afar was not worth it. In that moment I was silently nodding in agreement to myself. While Marcy was finishing up with payment from a patient, Neem came out and grabbed the parking pass and took me outside to show me where to park and where to leave the pass on the dash then we chatted for a few minutes about what the heck is going on with the location, and that it wasn’t convenient for many long-time patients. While we’re chatting I’m watching 2 police officers having a field day writing up tickets for illegal parkers. Neem lets me know that this place is too far for her with a now commute of almost 3 hours a day for a 5 hour shift. She said she’ll stick it out until the snow comes and is pretty sure the winter will help make her decision to leave. We also talked about the letter that I found weird.

Neem proceeds to tell me that the letter was a mistake, it was an option for those who wished to stay in the area, but apparently quite a few were taking that option. So I said I may check out the suggested dentist office as well, and ask a few questions about their services, and maybe I’ll end up going there too. So Neem says, if I go there, would I mention her availability to whomever I speak to because she wouldn’t mind working there too. Then she went inside and I ran back to the car with the pass and drove with hub to the parking lot, and we grabbed a beautiful handicapped spot right facing the front of the office building. We were instructed to place the pass on the dashboard, and return it to Marcy when we were ready to leave.

Pass was in place on the dash and we walked across the street and when we walked in the office Marcy greeted us. We chit chatted, my husband’s phone rang so Marcy and I continued to chat, then Neem came to call me in and stopped to chat with us too. We had a few chuckles of the craziness going on with the move, and I asked where Dr. B was because she was doing my teeth and Neem told me no, Dr. B wasn’t coming in today (as she had her own mercury madness to contend with),  so Neem would be cleaning my teeth and someone else would be cleaning hub’s teeth. My arms flew up as I was a bit disappointed that nobody told me this or I may have booked for another day because as much as I love Neem doing my teeth, I had a few questions for the dentist, and hub was complaining of feeling a lot of sensitivity in one of his teeth – both requiring Dr. B to have a look. But we were there and after all the kerfuffle and having finally parked the car, we stayed.

The dental rooms were partially open concept – 4 rooms with half walls. I could see hub diagonally located across from me. Neem and I are gabbing (as best as I could respond with tools in my mouth) about making plans to get together socially. Then 2 minutes later, while Neem is working on my teeth, I had a revelation and pushed her hand away, and darted out of the chair. I shouted to my husband kitty-corner to me, Did you put the handicapped license on the dashboard?

He replies with garbled words with an instrument in his mouth, “Shit, I forgot.” I knew it! We were so frazzled with the parking pass, and placing it on the dash, we both forgot to pull the handicapped license from the visor and place it on the dashboard to avoid a steeeeeeep ticket for illegally parking in a handicapped spot. It already happened once before, my hub was fined in front of his doctor’s office for not placing the license in a perfect eye level place for a police to see it, which I fought and won, and thought I’d drilled the lesson into him. But, apparently, we both forgot this time, which has never happened, and I had a flash of those cops writing tickets while we were waiting for the parking pass, and I didn’t recall seeing the license on the dash, so I panicked. If those cops were still ticketing, this could be a $500 fine, and this time there’d be nothing to fight because it wasn’t about how the license was positioned, but that it wasn’t there at all.

I jumped out of the chair, ran over to hub to grab the car key and ran like a bat out of hell to the parking lot. And gratefully, no ticket! I opened the door and grabbed the license from the envelope and placed it precisely on the dashboard, smacked the door shut, and ran back to my chair. It was hot.

When I came back, Neem presented me with a lovely gift, a whitening kit. She told me she told Marcy she wanted to give me something in appreciation for how long I’d been with Dr. B and all the crap I went through already. I finished getting my pearly whites cleaned and checked up on hub, and found he has a cracked crown causing his discomfort, which in turn will have us going back soon again when Dr. B is there for hub to get fitted for a new crown. $$$$.

Yup, Mercury Retrograde supposedly ends tomorrow, but I know from experience, it will take its sweet time leaving as it lingers and wanes for another 2 weeks. Till then, I’m lying low!

 

©DGKaye