two days of hell with no solution in sight

A couple of days ago I notice that all the dates in all my Excel documents have converted to some bizarre looking format whereby the letter d follows or proceeds days and months:

'

And worse, my options in Excel are a mess:

I can't even format new cells correctly.

I begin by calling Apple support. Person #1  looks at the problem and concludes, "I've never seen anything like this. You need to call Microsoft."

I don't want to do that, so I call back, an hour later, hoping the next person will be willing to help.

Person  #2 at Apple disconnects me by accident, 20 minutes into the call.  She doesn't call back despite having my phone number.

So I try Microsoft.

I spend the next two hours with a surprisingly helpful guy from somewhere in Asia who finally concludes (after a complete uninstall and reinstall twice of the Office suite) that there's no problem with the Microsoft software (it works fine on a test account we set up).

I call Apple again. Another two hours with Adam until my patience gives out and I reschedule for more hell today.

I awake this morning with optimism and stamina. I call Apple and get Aaron. In the course of  our 131 minute conversation we uncover (I hope not create) more problems unrelated to Excel and solve nothing.

Aaron escalates my non-Excel problems to the Apple engineers — I never even knew there was such a group.  Aaron thinks the only solution might be a total reinstall of everything piece by piece. This is my worst tech nightmare (short of losing all my stuff).

Sooooooooo frustrating.

I remember a few years ago visiting friends in a small Connecticut town. They had just spent a ton of money to dig up their front yard and replace their septic tank. Ken described it this way, "It's like buying a brand new car and then burying it in your front yard."

That's sort of how I feel.  Hours and hours wasted with nothing at all to show for it. 

There has to be a solution, though, right?  

But what if it can't be found?

Will I have to adjust my thinking and accept seeing January 14 displayed as 1d14d16?  I doubt it; I'm not that forgiving.