The return to reality day was tough. What used to a pleasant experience called flying is a brutal, time expansion to a full day of misery.

Without the gruesome details, we got home around 11:00 p.m. i was dedicated to dumping everything in the house and hitting the rack, but i have a compunction to unpack, and i did, finally getting to bed just after 1:00 a.m., 10:00 p.m. Kauai time.

That travel compounded by the three-hour time change left me just a tad over the top on curmudgeonry this morning. i slept a bit late, understandably i thought, and rushed to my dental appointment.

i was not in the mood for the receptionist’s news of they had upgraded their system. She explained i had to fill out new forms. Then she handed me a notepad thingy instead of several pieces of paper…check that, half a ream of paper. This thingy pad required me to touch the answers, not fill in the blanks.

The first questions dealt with my goals for the condition of my teeth or something like that. It stirred my recall of a dentist a number of years earlier, who had just taken over my favorite dentist’s business when the elder one retired. The office had undergone a redo. Pictures of beautiful women with smiling white perfect teeth filled the walls. When this dentist comes in to see me, he stands before me and asks, “What would you like your teeth to be in five years?” assuming i’m guessing that he was expecting a response i would like mine to look like those teeth of those beautiful women.

i replied, “In.”

He was not a happy camper.

* * *

Back to today, this thingy pad questionnaire wanted me to give it a complete medical history, current medications, number of diseases, illnesses, and operations of me, my family for generations and about half the citizenry of the U.S. of A. After each section, it required me to digitally sign with my finger my signature, for me an impossible task. After two of these, i just drew a line.

After about 15 pages of this Q&A, i tired. i begin to just put “No” as my answer. It was clearly a CYA by some organization designed to torture inputters. Then, i got to a question that caught my eye: “Have you ever had an unpleasant experience during a dental appointment?”

i tapped “yes” instead of “no.” This opened up the option for me and my doctor to comment. But my comment section did not work. So i went to the doctor’s place for comment. To the question of “Have you ever had an unpleasant experience during a dental appointment?” and tapping yes, i wrote, “Filling out this form.”

i felt better.

* * *

While sporadically and ploddingly chasing the unpacking and chores while taking two naps and wishing for more, i sat down for dinner. Unwilling to listen to the scaremongering news, i turned the idiot box (i still love that term) to the NFL Monday Night Football. After less than five minutes, i turned it off. The three announcers over and incorrectly analyzed each play with gibberish they, i assume, thought intelligent. It wasn’t.

And i wondered why.

i remembered Al Michaels, Howard Cosell, and Dandy Don Meredith. It was fun to listen back then.

* * *

i hope Tuesday is better. Has to be. No dentist. No NFL. AND no Joe Buck.