After the Ottawa Senators game in ScotiaBank Place; Dec. 29, 2007 – Photo by Me.
“A Drug Against War”; KMFDM
Let me know if the YouTube’s missing…
Caring for yourself, looking after your physical health, just isn’t a priority for someone who constantly wants to die. It wasn’t like I was in pain, my teeth were usually in pretty good shape, but I wasn’t flossing or rinsing or brushing three times a day either.
“…The Little Things Get Neglected”; Something I wrote last Spring
We need to be able to find small victories, little moments we can lose ourselves in so we can fight against the voice in our head telling us what a huge fucking failure we’ve become because we couldn’t stop failing over the years and decades which make up our lives.
“…There’s A Very Real Risk…”, Something I wrote January 08.
I actually feel like I scored a couple of small victories today… which is great because there was one fuck of a failure as well.
I’m back on mushy food again so I’m eating a banana… last night marked the median in what will be three weeks between recovering from the last tooth being taken out and this one, it was the one night between Recovery and recovery Again where I was able to eat solid food. So I ordered out for Chinese and carefully ate eight chicken wings and a container of beef and broccoli. Now, again, I can barely chew a ripe banana.
It’s not that the process has become easier, I just know what to expect now. Later on I’ll have some pasta with a little butter and cheese…
So the failure, of course, was losing another tooth to one of the various Periodontal diseases and the nearly two decades of smoking and the crappy hygiene and the genetics… my grandmother, who grew up in Alberta during the Great Depression, had lost all of her teeth before she was twenty. Mom’s having bone density problems as well…
But I’m actually kind of okay right now. I think I was expecting to feel like I was kicked in the face as I left the Dentist office… but I didn’t. I actually felt Better… not great, but a little better from when I went in, and filming the event was the difference. The Dentist and the Assistant were cool with me doing what I did, in fact the Dentist actually suggested the best angle for shooting.
I am going to write this, just to get it out of the way… my Dentist is Smoking hot. Like HAWah-T Hot. There. It’s out in the open. She’s funny and professional and fantastic at her job but damn… anyway. Yes, I am holding a camera while she digs a tooth out of my skull… I almost missed getting the tooth, I thought she took it away then when I realized it was on my chest she grabbed it… I need some kind of Production Assistant for these things.
The Extraction… a Salted Lithium Production
The other little victory was about photos… a friend of mine asked me around Christmas to take pictures of him and his girlfriend’s family. The mother/grandmother was in town from Alberta and it was the first time in years the whole family had been under one roof. I did it, but I’ve been nervous ever since.
It was the first time I’ve used the SLR in over a year, the lighting was shit, there was a room full of people I didn’t know and here I was with all of this Responsibility. I actually got sick the next night because I thought I had fucked the whole thing. So Dean brought the photos (144) over this afternoon and they turned out fantastic. It was like I almost knew what I was doing… then we cranked up the Judas Priest and played Twisted Metal Black on the PS2 for a couple of hours.
I lost a tooth, something I’ve had for thirty-seven years, but I think I won the day.
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06
...salted lithium. 
You know, watching that video of you getting a tooth out wasn’t very disturbing. Listening to it, on the other hand, was terrifying. Well done and such, though.
Thanks. The photos of the last two extractions are way cooler. If you listen closely you can hear the fantastic French Canadian accent of my mega-HAW-tah dentist, so that might be worth playing it again. It actually looks like the whole thing has been slightly sped up through the YouTube transfer process… my eyes are bouncing like I just chugged a Litre of Red Bull.
I have to admit I couldn’t watch the video.
Yesterday I finally made my first appointment at the dentist in over two years. This for me was small victory enough as I have a real fear of dentists and when I was depressed getting my arse out of the house for even pleasant things was difficult.
Apparently I’ve to get a couple of fillings, two teeth pulled and what remains of the roots of a molar.
(it disintegrated after months of prozac induced night-time teethgrinding -anyone else get that?)
I’m going to be brave like you and get this work done.
This is one of the little goals I’ve set myself in my “getting better”.
Hope you have a quick recovery and get back to enjoying tasty bites!
I’m not watching that. I don’t think I can. 😛
Sounds like an ok day, assuming you didn’t grab the dentist. 🙂 Mine are always old and slightly creepy.
Which reminds me for the 3rd time this week I need to make an appt.. sigh…don’t wanna.
Yay, you’re so strong!
No fucking way in hell i can watch the vid, tho! me sorry (i can’t stand those plaque bastards and their procedures!)
But i can celebrate and be happy for you.
Smooth healing, sweetheart. =)
Believe me, not so strong. It’s the first time, like Puddle, that takes more than a little courage. There’s something to living through a Thing, knowing what it’s like, to making it easier the next time… because you generally know when the pain is going to end.
The video really isn’t bad, just before she takes the tooth out I say something like “nope, can’t feel a thing”, and I didn’t. There was no blood visible, the only weird sounds come from the suction doohickey. The expression on my face never changes… I think the dentists I had as a kid paid for the numbing agent themselves, so they only ever used half a dose. This dentist actually told me “…if you can feel anything at all lift your left arm and we’ll give you some more [giggle juice], there’s no need to suffer in silence”. I think that was the moment I fell in love with her. Most dentists here now operate what are called “Pain Free Clinics”, next time I’m there — in March for a cleaning — I’ll take a picture of the poster.
And believe me, Thor and Puddle, the pain that comes with recovering From a dental procedure is a lot easier to live with than living With the pain from an infected tooth because you know it gets better as it heals. It’s only been a day and I can fully open my mouth and I’ve moved up to peaches and Chef Boyardee. Tomorrow it’s cheese and soft bread…
Well, I loved the video! You’re so hilarious!
I have no problem with dentists. Alright, going for my appointments is not my favourite activity but I’m fine. I just get bored. And I can’t stand making small talk with the hygienists (or trying to while your mouth is spread wide open!)
I think it comes from having a really awesome and oh-so-gentle dentist as a kid. I mean, his voice was as soft as his fingers were in your mouth.
Holy shit, does that sound…erm…well, kind of like something else *laughing*
But seriously, he was great. And when I had to have two extractions for my braces, I was young and all WTF??? He gave me Nitrous Oxide and I was like…”Pull them all out!!! Whee!!!”
Wow, if I could get my hands on that stuff, now? I’d never leave the house. Well, I wouldn’t be able to as I wouldn’t have the motivation and I wouldn’t be able to move.
Anyway, Gabriel… I’d like to propose marriage. Come live with me and…we’ll get married. Well, no–we can just live common law, actually. I have a decent benefit plan. I can take care of your teeth, meds…other stuff too. Although, I don’t know if I’m as HAWah-T Hot as your dentist so you might not want to give her up for me *laughing so hard*
We’d have to get a bigger flat, though. That’s fine. I need to move, anyway.
Or we can have separate living spaces. Nicolas Cage did that with some other star or something. That might be better as we both could possibly crave our own spaces. PA actually does live better on her own unless she’s living with a partner or lover. And wouldn’t be lovers…no, no. Women all the way.
But I can definitely assure you that my (male) dentist is not hot. No, not at all.
Hmmm. Maybe instead of me you could marry your dentist?
Oh, I meant to say “we” wouldn’t be lovers. I got all frazzled thinking and writing about sex.
Which reminds me…I guess I should write the silly post I was thinking about today…?
Yeah, I guess I better “get it up” to “keep it up” with the whole Blog365 thing.
Sorry…that last sentence was really, really bad… I’m tired and I need to go home.
I don’t know PatAnon, I think this 365 day thing is messing with your decision making ability… I know gay marriage is now as legal as straight marriage but I don’t know if the world is ready for straight / gay marriage.
All: Something weird happened while I was in Ottawa today (Ikea office chair, bookcase: $265), we stopped at a diner on the way into town for lunch and while we were having a conversation I noticed my voice had changed… at the end of my sentences I had a kind of ‘slush’ sound. Now, I’m a naturally lazy talker… I mumble and slur my words and my first attempt at speaking is generally incomprehensible, so I’m hoping it’s just because my mouth is still sore but I think it’s possible my cheeks are being sucked into the new gaping holes in my face.
My grandmother was at her dentist on Friday having three posts installed. She had all of her teeth removed when she was fourteen… it was the Great Depression, it’s what they did for kicks because there were no PlayStations.
It’s a relatively new procedure where they implant what are basically three screws into your jaw, then later they on screw a bunch of fake teeth (I think it’s only one tooth per post, but why would someone want three permanent teeth implanted while still having thirty false ones? I’ll figure it out later…). No disability or pension plan in Canada covers them right now, so my grandmother dropped $10,000 on the three posts. They last pretty much forever so I’m hoping to get them in the will…
Tee Hee!
Believe me…my decision making skills were messed up way before Blog365 and way before blogging period!