Dental Work

Hey, ho, what's up? My gingiva is in pain. Those are your gums. For a girl who prides herself on flossing and brushing more fervently than she does almost anything else (perhaps even including her religion(?)) it is a major bummer when she has dental issues. That girl is me. Yesterday I spent almost two hours having a molar prepped for an on-lay. I guess brushing and flossing can only get you so far. I can't imagine what my mouth would be like if I had poor dental hygiene. Lots of tugging and drilling and impressions yesterday. I think maybe my dentist must be building a new deck or something because the only option she gave me for my on-lay was the most expensive one they had available. Thank The Good Lord I have family in the dental business and they let me know that I actually had more options. As we speak, my gold piece is being crafted at the mint! Very fancy, I know. I like to call the dental lab the mint because they deal in precious metals so same-same. My dentist wanted to use something else but once I found out I could get GOLD at a fraction of the cost of course I had to get it. It'll be in the back of my mouth anyways so I really don't care what color it is. Plus we are apartment dwellers, so I'm counting this little nugget as my chief emergency preparedness effort. I think my father would be proud.

I don't have any pictures to accompany all this talk about my dental work. But just imagine, as I do, that  when getting dental work done it's kind of like a beach vacation. You get sunglasses so the sun doesn't shine too brightly in your eyes and the sound of all the equipment buzzing and humming- I like to say it's the ocean. Maybe not the most inviting ocean ever, but hey, you are still at the dentist so whateves. Then yesterday did they ever roll out the red carpet for me. The numbing gel they put on my gums before the anesthetic was piña colada flavored. How did they know??!! I basically had a piña colada made in my mouth and then sat on the beach for a couple hours. And instead of a sunburn I only have some sore gums. Sometimes I'm not sure which is better.

Bottle Drives

My Favorite Green Soothie

2 Big Ol' Handfuls of Spinach
1/2 Banana
Lemon- half inch slice with rind
1 1/2 C Frozen Fruit (my fav is the Costco mix of melon, pineapple, strawberry, peach)
Water as needed

The rind is the secret weapon here, don't let that voice in your head tell you otherwise.







You can add other stuff as you like, from time to time I do. The other day I dug out a bag of frozen peas I thought we ate already and poured some on in. If my strawberries are looking especially sad I throw those in too. Today I put half of an over ripe pear in and that was kinda gross but still edible. I was quickly reminded of why I should not buy fresh fruit out of season. That particular day at the store the pears were staring up at me and I could not resist buying a few so I gambled, I gambled and I lost. Those dang pears took 13 days to ripen and I didn't use them until day 17. I don't know what my problem is but you know how it is. The over ripe pear kind of made the smoothie taste like how a Bottle Drive smells. Where I come from you can collect $$ for empty bottles so we did a lot of Bottle Drives to fundraise and do Bottle Drives ever stink. Drinking this mornings smoothie made me nostalgic for the Slave Lake Sharks Swim Club though, so I guess putting that rotten half a pear in the smoothie wasn't a complete waste. Oh the Bottle Drives! And, you know, Jude still sucked his down so I'm chalking it up as an all around win. Kid loves his smoothies. I do believe the lemon with rind saved the day in the end.

I love Asia, I hate Asia

On Saturday I had a conversation like this with a very nice dental assistant at the mall:

p-cute: "do you think you could give me an estimate of how much the exam and new patient

assessment are going to cost?"

DA: "It's hard, you know. It depends on how much scaling has to be done and how long the dentist is with you for."

p-cute: "Oh, I bursh and floss everyday and usually take no time at all at the dentists office..."

DA: "it'll be approximatley xxx amount, if you say things are as they are."

**********

Apparently things are not as they are. I got up this morning at 6:45am, just enough time to do the minimilist morning routine before I had to be at the dentists office at 7:20am. The hygenist is cleaning my teeth and hits some rather sensitive areas. She says I probably have some cavities, which, you know, I can deal with. The dentist comes in and gives me the verdict in his best ESL " you have 5 cavitie".

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Payne people don't have cavities! At least this one doesn't. Turns out my sealent wore off in the past year since I have seen the dentist and boom, 5 cavities. I have memories of going to Dr. Fremmits office, being cavity free, but having to wait for my mother who had 8 cavities and a root canal all being worked on at the same time. Man!!

The sweet little Asian dentist and hygenist that I was so attracted to have failed me. I loved that they work 12 hour days starting at 7:30am. I love that they are quick and efficient and do not have unnecessary conversations with me due to ESL. Now I don't love them. Now they are going to drill my teeth. Now they are going to cost me a small fortune. Now they are evil and want to take over the world.