Happy hour is generally when all drinks are the same low price, right? If that applied to dentistry, then a crown (usually a very expensive procedure) would be a steal at that time, even though the patient didn’t need any. At least, that’s what I thought when I saw it.
either that, or the anesthesia hasn’t worn off yet, so he can double down on another painful procedure, since “happy hour” is “feeling no pain” time. Hard to guess one way or the other.
It’s F-. What more needs to be said?
Bars have happy hours. Dentists don’t. Wouldn’t it be weird if dentists had happy hours.
That’s all there is to it.
I agree with Woozy. Maybe.
That does seem to be all there is to it. But I can’t tell if W thinks there ought to be more?
BTW, a crown would certainly not be easily made ready in a few minutes. Typically it requires a return appointment, doesn’t it?
“BTW, a crown would certainly not be easily made ready in a few minutes.”
On the contrary, there’s a drawer full of temporary crowns somewhere in the dentist’s office.
Now that you mention it, I do remember something like that! But I think they avoided the term “crown” — like, “Your crown will be ready in a couple weeks, for now we’ll put on a temporary cap.”
This is definitely a CIDU. My own view is that a successful comic gets at least one of the following responses: “That’s funny” or “That’s clever.” When you’re staring at a comic wondering what the point might be, or even if there is one, that’s when I find a comic less than successful.
It does take time to make a crown, and there’s extra time because they are usually made elsewhere, and must be delivered.
But they can’t leave you walking around with the post for the crown exposed… you’ll damage the post, and then the crown won’t fit properly. So they have the temporary crowns to put on between preparing the post and fitting the “permanent” crown. The temporary isn’t made to fit in your particular mouth, like the permanent one is. But it only has to last for a week or so.
Implants are even more complicated. Your bones have to heal from having the posts mounted, and THEN they can design and install the crown on it.
The joke is there is the experience of being in a dental chair is sort of the antithesis of happy hour. There is nothing happy about it, A dentist having a happy hour would be incongruous.
At first I thought the dentist was implying that he was drinking. And I associate ‘happy hour’ with two-for-one, not all-one-price, but then, I don’t drink and I don’t go to bars.Pretty much a CIDU for me, too.
I think ja has it. In the public imagination there are fewer places less happy than the dentist’s office.
I sent this one to my dental hygienist last month as a prep for my cleaning – she loved it, and hardly gouged me at all.
It’s a political cartoon. The demand for medical services isn’t elastic, and therefore, lowering the price of medical services won’t increase the usage of it. Thus, it is silly to advertise half-price crowns, since a person won’t buy them if they don’t need them.
So, this cartoon is an indictment of the current idea to use market forces to manage the costs of health care, by pointing out how absurd the concept is.
I don’t think it INTENDS to be a political cartoon, but it ends up that way, anyway.
” The demand for medical services isn’t elastic, and therefore, lowering the price of medical services won’t increase the usage of it.”
There’s an assumption here that isn’t supported.
I can state with authority that there are people who choose extraction (priced at $x) rather than crowning (Priced at $XXX). There are any number of chronic illnesses that go untreated because the sufferers cannot afford treatments.
If a tooth has a smile and brushes its own teeth, do those teeth also have smiles and teeth and need to brush, or is that ridiculous, ad inception, because teeth don’t have smiles and teeth (and arms)?
My first thought, and it still is, is what billybob said at the start. The cartoonist is equating being anesthetized in a dentist chair to having had a few at the local pub during happy hour. “Hey buddy. It’s still happy hour, want a shot of Crown Royal or something?” vs. “Hey buddy, you’re still numb, want a new crown or something?” And in both situations, you’re going to come out of it with a headache.
I was in grade school the first time I needed dentistry severe enough for anesthesia with nitrous oxide. I remember walking back to school, and wondering if my feet were touching the ground as I walked because I was still so floaty.
THAT was a happy hour.
Comics I Don't Understand 
Happy hour is generally when all drinks are the same low price, right? If that applied to dentistry, then a crown (usually a very expensive procedure) would be a steal at that time, even though the patient didn’t need any. At least, that’s what I thought when I saw it.
either that, or the anesthesia hasn’t worn off yet, so he can double down on another painful procedure, since “happy hour” is “feeling no pain” time. Hard to guess one way or the other.
It’s F-. What more needs to be said?
Bars have happy hours. Dentists don’t. Wouldn’t it be weird if dentists had happy hours.
That’s all there is to it.
I agree with Woozy. Maybe.
That does seem to be all there is to it. But I can’t tell if W thinks there ought to be more?
BTW, a crown would certainly not be easily made ready in a few minutes. Typically it requires a return appointment, doesn’t it?
“BTW, a crown would certainly not be easily made ready in a few minutes.”
On the contrary, there’s a drawer full of temporary crowns somewhere in the dentist’s office.
Now that you mention it, I do remember something like that! But I think they avoided the term “crown” — like, “Your crown will be ready in a couple weeks, for now we’ll put on a temporary cap.”
This is definitely a CIDU. My own view is that a successful comic gets at least one of the following responses: “That’s funny” or “That’s clever.” When you’re staring at a comic wondering what the point might be, or even if there is one, that’s when I find a comic less than successful.
It does take time to make a crown, and there’s extra time because they are usually made elsewhere, and must be delivered.
But they can’t leave you walking around with the post for the crown exposed… you’ll damage the post, and then the crown won’t fit properly. So they have the temporary crowns to put on between preparing the post and fitting the “permanent” crown. The temporary isn’t made to fit in your particular mouth, like the permanent one is. But it only has to last for a week or so.
Implants are even more complicated. Your bones have to heal from having the posts mounted, and THEN they can design and install the crown on it.
The joke is there is the experience of being in a dental chair is sort of the antithesis of happy hour. There is nothing happy about it, A dentist having a happy hour would be incongruous.
At first I thought the dentist was implying that he was drinking. And I associate ‘happy hour’ with two-for-one, not all-one-price, but then, I don’t drink and I don’t go to bars.Pretty much a CIDU for me, too.
I think ja has it. In the public imagination there are fewer places less happy than the dentist’s office.
I sent this one to my dental hygienist last month as a prep for my cleaning – she loved it, and hardly gouged me at all.
It’s a political cartoon. The demand for medical services isn’t elastic, and therefore, lowering the price of medical services won’t increase the usage of it. Thus, it is silly to advertise half-price crowns, since a person won’t buy them if they don’t need them.
So, this cartoon is an indictment of the current idea to use market forces to manage the costs of health care, by pointing out how absurd the concept is.
I don’t think it INTENDS to be a political cartoon, but it ends up that way, anyway.
” The demand for medical services isn’t elastic, and therefore, lowering the price of medical services won’t increase the usage of it.”
There’s an assumption here that isn’t supported.
I can state with authority that there are people who choose extraction (priced at $x) rather than crowning (Priced at $XXX). There are any number of chronic illnesses that go untreated because the sufferers cannot afford treatments.
If a tooth has a smile and brushes its own teeth, do those teeth also have smiles and teeth and need to brush, or is that ridiculous, ad inception, because teeth don’t have smiles and teeth (and arms)?
My first thought, and it still is, is what billybob said at the start. The cartoonist is equating being anesthetized in a dentist chair to having had a few at the local pub during happy hour. “Hey buddy. It’s still happy hour, want a shot of Crown Royal or something?” vs. “Hey buddy, you’re still numb, want a new crown or something?” And in both situations, you’re going to come out of it with a headache.
I was in grade school the first time I needed dentistry severe enough for anesthesia with nitrous oxide. I remember walking back to school, and wondering if my feet were touching the ground as I walked because I was still so floaty.
THAT was a happy hour.