Shoes
Tuesdays are usually good days. I have my riding lesson on Tuesdays.* Today I had to go to the dentist.**
It took three stabs to render me sufficiently numb, which means that now it’s worn off again my jaw feels like it was broken like a potato chip/crisp and then stapled together, supposing you can use staples on a potato chip/crisp, and after only the first jab I found the top of my head lifting off and the rest of me juddering like a sapling in a tornado.*** I feel very odd, I said, hanging on to the chair to keep from falling out of it, I feel as if I’m having a . . . like an adrenaline attack.
Oh yes, said the dentist blandly. That happens sometimes.
!!!!!??!???!??!?!????????!!!!!!!!?
There’s adrenaline in the anaesthetic, he went on, to constrict the blood vessels, so the anaesthetic lasts longer. Occasionally a little of it leaks directly into a blood vessel during the injection, and then this may happen.
So then we had to wait for it to wear off before he could get on with the show.
I was in there for the relatively nontraumatic-in-terms-of-physical-pain matter of having the three crowns put on the three teeth he disassembled last time†. So he banged and hammered and pulled stuff off and put stuff on for a while and then he said . . .
These crowns just aren’t good enough. I’m going to send them back to the lab.
SO WE HAVE TO DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN! AND IT’S WORSE THAN THAT, BECAUSE HE’S GOING TO REDO THE MOULDS AND BLAH AND WHATEVER TOO! So rather than coming out today having something finished, I’ve just regressed two appointments. In a game of Snakes and Ladders I’ve hit a snake. And they can’t fit me in till the end of September. The second appointment is the beginning of October. And I was already demoralised†† by his having run through the options for the next piece of major reconstruction (similar in scope and expense to restoring Windsor Castle after the fire) while we were waiting for the adrenaline to wear off.
So I rushed wailing out onto the street and . . . bought shoes. Of course. Anyone would. It’s not quite that bad. No, it’s worse. But, I mean, buying shoes. Peter came into town with me, and we were going to meet back at the car after my appointment, long enough for me to run a quick errand. The errand in question was to go to the Surprisingly Comfortable without Being Small-Child-Scaringly Ugly Shoes Shop, and look for sandals, which should be on sale by now. This is a perfectly legitimate errand. The problem is that they were having a major end of season Everything Must Go sale and about 90% of it was in my size.††† Well, at least I did get the sandals. I was also twenty minutes late back to the car. I said, I prostrate myself grovellingly at your feet. Peter said, No, no, I knew this would happen, I brought something to read.
We could now take bets that I’ll finally get around to the organised-and-thoughtful tomorrow.
^^ Do you remember the pigeon?
** But I barely got my book out of my knapsack before he came bounding down the stairs for me. This was after the receptionist said with awful emphasis, He’ll only be two or three minutes!
*** Or a chucklehead after her third mug of tea. Well, I don’t always count very well. My mind is on other things.
† And kept me waiting forty minutes and then charged me £1,000,000. The forty minutes is true. The £1,000,000 is slightly exaggerated, but it’s all relative. Relative to my bank account, it was £1,000,000.
†† Well that’s a non sequitur. I’m demoralised automatically, walking across his threshold.
††† This happens to me kind of a lot. The rest of me is small enough that there are often really interesting things on the sale rack in my size^, and my feet are enormous, so there are quite often shoes in my size too. Oh, sob, poooor me, such torture. Trying not to buy everything! Ak! Agony! Affliction!
^ See: Best Hot Frock
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::hugs::
Oh dear. Haven’t we previously established that dentists are sadists??
Mum has had her bridgework replaced 3 times in the last 6 weeks. The last time the “temporary glue” only lasted 6 days. (Her regular dentist is away). She rang them up and told them she was NOT having another trip to Melbourne just to have it come out in 6 days! She doesn’t have the anaethesia any more either cuz of reactions. :(
OH GODS. No wonder she has to buy shoes. ****Sympathy****
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Haven’t we previously established that dentists are sadists??
No, not all of them. My dentists–father and son–are wonderful human beings who have seen me from the cavities in my baby teeth all the way up through the two crowns I’ve incurred in recent years.
YOUR dentist, however, is an utter ass. :( Setting aside his basic lack of human kindness, why on earth you should have to pay him a million pounds (relative) to then fail to complete the job is beyond me. It’s not YOUR fault the crowns don’t fit, he should be apologizing profusely and promising to get it taken care of ASAP.
There are words for people like this; “utter ass” are really two of the kinder ones….
My dentists–father and son–are wonderful human beings
******No. Wrong. They have this special gas, and . . .
**No. Wrong. They have this special gas, and . . .
LOL! Nah. Just nice guys who happen to drill teeth for a living. The dad’s name is Ralph, and the son’s is Bruce. Really, how could anyone named “Ralph” ever be threatening? :)
It will probably squik you out even more than reading the dental horror stories below to know that I (due to a massive phobia regarding anesthesia) don’t get my jaw numbed at all when I go in for a filling. The crowns, yes, that was a bit more than I could sit through. But for fillings, no. (And I’ve had more fillings than I have teeth… the eventual failure of which is leading to the progressive need for crownwork. Sigh.)
I have a MORE massive phobia about PAIN. And NICE GUYS DO NOT DRILL TEETH FOR A LIVING. QED.
NICE GUYS DO NOT DRILL TEETH FOR A LIVING. QED.
They’re rarer than unicorns, true. :) I don’t deny being hugely lucky in this respect, considering how crappy my teeth are. I’ve spent an awful lot of time at Casa de Ralph ‘n’ Bruce. (The hygienist is Bruce’s sister, Ann. When I go in for a cleaning she’s always listening to NPR, and we have great conversations about her horses, dogs, fossil-hunting expeditions…)
I have a MORE massive phobia about PAIN.
Your fear of pain may trump my fear of anesthesia, but I’m betting it’d be a close race. Honestly. It’s even scarier than centipedes. The WORST would be a centipede with a phial of morphine in its little articulated claws…. GAH.
she’s always listening to NPR
******* Well I hope she rushed out and bought SUNSHINE.
The WORST would be a centipede with a phial of morphine in its little articulated claws…. GAH.
******** AAAUGH. Will you *lay off* the Lovecraft already???
Well I hope she rushed out and bought SUNSHINE.
I wouldn’t be surprised if she had, at that! :)
AAAUGH. Will you *lay off* the Lovecraft already???
Lovecraft would have been far worse. An iridescent, oily black centipede crawling over ancient cyclopean stones and chittering something about getting a prescription for laudanum…
An iridescent, oily black centipede **with a human face.** :)
An iridescent, oily black centipede **with a human face.** :)
LOL! See, I told you, it’s your next breakout genre. Lovecraftian cyberpunk horror, by Robin “The Unspeakable” McKinley… the possibilities are endless. :)
Ooooh! ‘The Unspeakable’! –I’ll have to get out my old black leather and studs after all. Oh, and the skull t shirt with the rhinestone eyes. *There’s* unspeakable. :)
Would totally pay to see that jacket photo! And you could get spike collars for the Hellhounds of Tindalos, and take them on tour with you:
“They are lean and athirst!” he shrieked… “All the evil in the universe was concentrated in their lean, hungry bodies. Or had they bodies? I saw them only for a moment, I cannot be certain.”
(Yes, that’s Frank Belknap Long, not Lovecraft… but they’re sharing a mythos. You could jump right in….)
They are lean and athirst! . . . . oh, oh, oh, ROTFL . . . ow ow ow ow *ow*.
They’re made of “All the Evil in the Universe,” Robin.
ALL OF IT. :) In JUST TWO DOGS.
In that case I’m going to stop bothering to be afraid of oily black centipedes with human faces.
I have kept *thinking* that (as I heave them over one of those impassable stiles) that they WEIGH an awful lot for something their size. It’s all that evil! Now I know! (Bad Horse doesn’t have a chance! We’re gonna oust that sucker!)
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!
Clearly you need lots of sorbet to recover from the dentist appointment. I just clutched at my face and whimpered a little. Ack ack.
So I rushed wailing out onto the street and . . . bought shoes. Of course. Anyone would.
I’d probably go for books or yarn (got books today – Gaiman’s STARDUST and McKillip’s SOLSTICE WOOD) but I understand shoes are a very popular thing to buy when under stress.
*sends hugs and ferrets*
I’d probably go for books or yarn
********** The shoe store was closer, and Peter was waiting. :) And I had an ERRAND, remember!!!!
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… Oh, sob, poooor me, such torture. Trying not to buy everything! Ak! Agony! Affliction! ….
Funnily enough, I’m often happy when something doesn’t fit so I don’t have to buy it.
YES. I know that one too. And NOT buying a book for its cover. :) ANYTHING to make me buy fewer books.
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I’ll express my sympathies about your dentist appointment.
However, I feel compelled to raise you one in the scheduling department, when I was told by the gastroenterologist today that the earliest they could fit me in for a colonoscopy was October 10th. It’s not enough that I must get tubes stuck in strange places, but I must WAIT to get the tubes stuck in strange places, so that they can determine whether I have a purple alien named Bob living in my intestines. (In reality, they’re trying to figure out whether I have IBS or Crohn’s/IBD or something else that’s not common at all. I prefer to think that Bob has taken up residence. =)
They’re not going to diagnose IBS from a colonscopy. Crohn’s–ugh. Let’s hope for Bob.
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Love, love, love the shoes. My feet still seem to be growing, at least wider, and the rest of me stopped getting taller 20 years ago, so it just doesn’t seem fair. Hard to find cool shoes for wide feet. I live vicariously through my normal-width, high-heeled sisters. :)
Your feet DO spread as you get older. In all directions. I’ve gone from a narrow to a medium and a 9 1/2 to 10-11. This is actually GOOD however. Your feet should be free to spread . . . out of every pair of shoes you own. Sigh. I’ll never get into my favourite pair of lady shoes again.
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There is something called Carbocaine in the US which my MiL gets at the dentist WHEN she uses any anaesthetic, which is used for persons with erratic heart beats. It’s the epinephrine in the anaesthetic which causes the fast-pittypat. I don’t have tachycardia, but I ALWAYS get the adrenaline surge, which feeds into my already nervous state. I can use the low-epi stuff with my current dentist, at least for the tie being. Little by little all my coping mechanisms were shed as I stayed with my current dentist longer and longer. Toothcleanings, which were my least liked procedure, has dropped off that radar, as the hygienist is much gentler at doing the same level of thoroughness, and the bitewing holders have become smaller and the corners have been rounded. I don’t have to use my anti-gag procedure even!
I wish you better times at the dentist.
And you are–?
If it happens again, I’ll ask about the Carbocaine. The problem is that this guy is the only specialist in the area who is willing to tackle my teeth. I just worry sometimes that his willingness is based on the wrong things. . . .
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****SO WE HAVE TO DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN! AND IT’S WORSE THAN THAT, BECAUSE HE’S GOING TO REDO THE MOULDS AND BLAH AND WHATEVER TOO!****
This has happened to me too. It is seriously depressing. ::Sends much sympathy and hugs::
Of course, there is nothing wrong with retail therapy, especially when it comes to finding shoes ON SALE. It would be flouting the gods to pass them up. All they need is a little space in the closet, and you can pat yourself on the back for being thrifty and saving money as you load the boxes into the car. How can that help but brighten up the day?
*Snork.* Yes. It’s always the ‘saving money’ that sends me off in shouts of laughter. But I still like both them and myself in the morning, so THAT’s okay. :)
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There are people who don’t understand the principle that if you buy things on sale, you are actually saving the difference between the sale price and the regular price. Really, this is so obvious it shouldn’t need to be stated at all. :)
:)
I have to admit that I went to the dentist for the first time in two years last month.
I have quite good teeth because I grew up in America where there is such a thing as preventative dental care. During my student days (in the UK), I’d go home once or twice a year and I went to the dentist then.
But I worked for NHS Direct for a year and it instilled in me a great fear of British dentists. Never before had I spoken to so many people who went to the dentist for a filling and came out with a tooth cracked in half. In America, I don’t know anyone whose teeth have fallen out. Or who have been told that they don’t want a bridge, they want half of their teeth pulled out.
So I have this irrational fear, but I finally went to the emergency dentist last month because I couldn’t actually open my mouth properly. In the space of two minutes, he glanced at my teeth, gave me an antibiotic prescription and loads of mouthwashes, advised salt water, and sent me away. Once I got outside, I realised he hadn’t bothered to tell me what he thought was wrong.
My faith is not restored. Your horror stories don’t help! :)
I’m sorry to make things worse but . . . it happens in America too. Granted I’m old, old, old, but I went to high school for two years in a very small village in the boonies where it was still sometimes done, and had been fairly recently *common*, to have all your teeth pulled and your first denture fitted FOR HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION. I am NOT joking.
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We lived outside of Seattle in the mid-eighties, and a young man in his early twenties was doing some sort of job for me around the house. I don’t remember how the subject came up, but he said that he would never bother to spend money at the dentist; when his teeth got bad enough, he’d have them all out and get false teeth and that would be that, period, end of expense. It got pretty rural pretty quickly out that way, but it was still hard to believe that a “let them rot and then replace them” attitude could have survived into the late twentieth century.
Golly. Yes. I’m busy trying to hang ON to mine while the DENTIST wants to take a few out.
****** I feel very odd, I said, hanging on to the chair to keep from falling out of it, I feel as if I’m having a . . . like an adrenaline attack.
Oh yes, said the dentist blandly. That happens sometimes.
Does this dentist charge in inverse relation to his communication skills? Ye Gods! No wonder you needed a shoe buying frenzy to compensate. I’m glad you found such lovely shoes, and how nice that Peter is so sanguine about delays in such a necessary cause :)
Are you feeling better now?
Why does my jaw still feel as if Gimli and six friends are in there digging for gold? He didn’t DO anything!!
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Nothing beats retail therapy after the torture of the dentist’s chair.
Husband’s crown has come out five times in the last year; the dentist is finally thinking of doing something different. But this may not work either, in which case we are looking at an implant which will cost £3,000 unless we go to Budapest and have it done there (well, is there an option, really – a couple of weekends in Budapest?!). But we hope it will work, as we want to go to the USA next March.
Me, I hate dentists and won’t go if I can help it.
I HATE THESE STORIES. Except that it does mean I am not *uniquely* tortured.
Not going to the dentist isn’t the answer, you know. When you finally do go you will be in big, big trouble
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The dentistry sounds frightful. You *need* shoes!
My feeling exactly. :)
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Robin wrote, “They’re not going to diagnose IBS from a colonscopy. Crohn’s–ugh. Let’s hope for Bob.”
I’m hoping for Bob too. I think the point of the colonoscopy is to make sure that it isn’t Crohn’s, which would then lead us to the conclusion that I have IBS. I think it depends on whether the insides of my intestines are inflammed or not.
Oh, oh! And I keep meaning to mention, since you said that there’s something with ME and dairy, and I’m not sure if it’s a lactose thing or whether dairy just makes ME worse. BUT. We thought for the last few months that I’ve been lactose intolerant, and I’m probably not now, but one of the few pleasures in life is that I’ve discovered I can eat is goat milk ice cream. Which apparently is structured in a way that you can digest lactose better, etc; I have no problems with it at all.
This is the company that makes it: http://www.goatmilkicecream.com/
I have the deep chocolate flavor and it’s like a bittersweet chocolate bar in ice cream form. Very, very good.
I really have to get brave and try goat. Thanks.
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*snort*
“I really have to get brave and try goat,” says Robin McKinley.
This line is so incredibly perfect. And quotable. *rubs hands together in evil giggly glee*
Knock yourself out. :)
Out of sympathy for your tortures, I won’t tell you how nice my dentist is. But you’d enjoy my hygienist. I always ask for the same woman so I can catch up on her horse stories. She collects horses the way some people acquire cats. She had two to begin with and bred one a couple of times. Then she had four. She found a couple of mistreated horses she adopted. Then she had six. Then her aunt died and left her a pony farm…the last I heard she’d forced herself to get rid of some and had only eight horses. She had bought a farm because she needed more barn and pasture.
What do you PAY your hygienist????
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Is it gloating to say that I haven’t had a new filling in ten years, that my dentist is kind and gentle and friendly and that I don’t dread passing his threshold? I have, however, a drawer-full of horror stories from previous dentists, so feel for you most profoundly. I hope all is now well.