August 11, 2005
Dear Everyone:
A full four weeks after the initial work was done, I finally got my new tooth this week. Last month, during the usual bi-annual checkup, the dentist decided that a particular molar, which was a collection of fillings held together by a remaining bit of tooth, needed to be replaced with a crown.
Nothing new about that. Mother swears that the very first time she ever took me in to see the family dentist, he took one look in my mouth, picked up the phone and ordered a backyard swimming pool, and then asked her if she’d had the flu while she was pregnant with me. Lots of fillings and crowns in my mouth. Only one tooth that’s never had any work done on it.
So we made the appointment to start work on replacing the back left upper molar with yet another crown. This dentist has all the latest gadgets, the chair that turns you upside down, the suction tube that goes into your mouth to suck up all the water, etc. And the x-ray machine now takes reusable “film” that is translated into pictures on a computer screen. There’s even a computer screen for the patient if the dentist wants to point out something.
And the temporary crown is no longer a generic metal cap that they glue on over the tooth. Instead, they make a wax mold of the tooth, then fill it with some kind of plaster to make the temp. What I didn’t know is just how delicate that plaster mold is. That night, not really thinking about it, I bit down on something mildly hard. And the temporary crown shattered. I carefully spit all the pieces out into a bowl and confirmed that the plaster mold was half still on my tooth and half in the bowl.
Add to that the fact that I was supposed to drive
to
I called the dentist’s office the next morning to
see if I could make an appointment for as soon as possible after
returning from
Apparently, it takes three weeks to make a proper
crown. Or more likely, three
weeks away was the soonest I could get an appointment to have the
permanent crown cemented. I
was supposed to get the new crown last Friday, but there was a change of
plans. They moved me to
Monday morning, but I already had a meeting with one of my customers
that morning. So the
receptionist called around and found someone who would trade their
I got there about 20 minutes early on Monday. But barely an hour later, I had a smooth new crown in place. Now I’m trying to break myself of the habit of only chewing on the right side. And I can finally bite into things like sandwiches again. Yeah!
Just in time for our trip to
But then I realized that, while it will be
In the meantime, I’m running around at work, trying to tie up as many loose ends as I can by the end of the day tomorrow. I once worked with a man who had the opinion that there is no such thing as paid vacation. He said that you work twice as hard as usual before you leave. Then, while you’re gone, no one does your work, so it’s waiting for you when you get back. Then you work twice as hard again to try and catch up.
But it’s the time in between that makes up for it. I’m looking forward to relaxing at “Alice’s” place for a week.
Love, as always,
Pete
PS: No
Letter next week. Not sure
if there will be one the week after as I may decide to stay home after
returning from New York/Oregon.
We’re keeping all our options open.
P.
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