I think the approach in Europe is quite different: both in Hungary and Switzerland, you get a local anaesthetic, and then diclofenac (an NSAID) for home. There is pain, but no effect on the central nervous system. And we return left-over drugs to the pharmacy, instead of flushing them.
Edit: sorry, I realise flushing is a sure way to get rid of them before anyone may get hooked or any accidents could happen. It’s just something I only ever see on TV.
Well, usually I don’t flush meds but rather hang onto them until they expire just in case they’re needed. But given the absence of later pain, the side effect and narcotic nature of Demerol there was no point in keeping it.
“Used” drugs (so to speak) are never returned – presumably for reissue? – due to the risk of tampering.
No, the pharmacies dispose of them in an environmentally appropriate manner.
No, not for reissue, of course, but for proper disposal. What you flush down the toilet pollutes the sewage. That sounds ridiculous, since sewage is polluted water, but drugs (whether narcotics or antibiotics) are not like what normally goes down the toilet.
My wife has been on a guided tour to the water treatment facility of Zürich. They were asked what they thought the hardest to treat contaminants were. Of course remains of drugs (from medicines and ‘recreational’ use) were the most popular guesses. Interestingly, they were all wrong: at the time, about 6 years ago, artificial sweeteners from low-calorie drinks caused the most problem. The bacteria used in the biological treatment of waste water was unable to digest them - just like we are.
This is eye opening. I wonder what this does to the bacteria in our gut and its side effects on our digestive system. Do the bacteria try to break it down and then die, altering our microbiome? I get that we eat a lot that goes mostly undigested, but a lot of that is “natural” stuff like heavy fibers that we have been eating for millennia. Another topic to for me to go read about 
“The scientific community still has no unanimous consensus on the appropriate outcomes and biomarkers that can accurately define the effects of NNS (Non-Nutritive Sweeteners) on the gut microbiota”, according to Effect of Non-Nutritive Sweeteners on the Gut Microbiota - PMC.
You all never fail to surprise me…
“Let’s talk about something random!”
“OK how about painful dentist stories, fake sugar and gut biomes?”
Not what I would’ve ever guessed!
With some recent rains in SoCal (horribly dry this season), some signs of greenery have appeared in my back yard (which is just dirt at the moment). Just humble little weeds, including some moss, which I love. I have been watering them a bit to sustain between rains.
I started a mossarium today, taking a little clump of moss with some soil, rocks, and a twig, and placing inside an oddly-shaped old wine bottle. Hopefully a beautiful moss-scape will grow.
“For Zen students, a weed is a treasure” - Shunryu Suzuki
“A weed is just a flower out of place.” - my father-in-law
Why does photo printing need to be so annoying? 
I know it just boils down to my ignorance, but I have been having a time trying to get an A3+ print completed this evening.
They’ve all been coming out of the printer at 8x11, regardless of settings and tray selection.
Urgh…I’ll get this sorted eventually, but I only had three sheets of A3+ paper to experiment with.
Out of curiosity, what is the printer’s brand?
Canon brand, discontinued product.
I’m going to try and print using the Canon utility (which I had forgotten was referred to me to try) when I get some more papers.
Yes, that is what I was going to recommend. If you use their paper, and your printer supports it, their phone app is good for prints. Of course it’s not a full color managed workflow, but it’s good enough and I notice no difference in colors from what I see on screen. Might be worth the try
Just saw this thread. Hope you’re feeling better by now Tim. Reminds me of when I had all my wisdom teeth out as a kid which at the time they did with general anaesthetic in hospital. There were four of us in a single ward having the same thing and remember waking up and looking around to see three blokes, who’d looked normal before the op, with massive Dizzie Gillespie chipmunk cheeks. And then realising I had them, too.
I have an amazing dentist and oral surgeon in Budapest who extracted my impacted wisdom teeth with local anesthesia. The process was long (3 hours for the right side, top/bottom, the bottom one had roots that had to be cut up to be pulled out cleanly, left side was quicker).
He told me before that it will be tedious compared to surgery in a hospital under anesthesia, but also that they do not like to keep you asleep for too long so they do a quick job, with less attention to preserving the surrounding tissue and it will heal slower and more painfully. I am glad I listened to him, all four healed very quickly and I was just taking some diclofenac the next day and that was it, no more pain.
Yeah, I don’t think they’d put you under here now. They don’t have the bed space, for one thing
Thank you. Yes, I’m feeling much better now. I still can’t eat just anything, but I can eat more things every day.
My guess would be the loudspeaker scene from Private Parts?
I had six wisdom teeth (absolutely no correlation with my wisdom), Air Force pulled them in the '70s under general anesthetic. Overnight in the hospital, probably more because I was single and living in the dormitory. Also during that era were my first two crowns, under gas. Dentist was grinding away, and I flinched. “Feel that?” he said? Me: 'Yup". He opened up the gas a bit. Few seconds later, flinched again. “Feel that?” “Yes.” This time, he cranked it much wider, didn’t remember a thing after that…
Good to hear