Dental Torment Ultra Extreme Mega Woah Woe (Blog 576)

As you may have guessed, I visited the dentist yesterday. As always, I had a ‘hygiene session’ (a euphemism for around 10 minutes of relentless teeth scraping) and then a regular checkup not long after. I actually came up with the blog title before visiting the dentist (well some of it, I later improved it with alliteration). I just assumed it would be fitting, however, I actually assumed wrongly as you’ll soon find out. Before leaving for the place, I did have a few thoughts though, those being the following. So… judging by all the effort that goes into booking an appointment (loads of email reminders, text reminders, the confirmation text you have to send, the online questionnaires and the digitally signed legal agreement :S) you’d think it would be a huge event, it’s not it’s just a dentist appointment. It made me feel big and responsible in a WAY, but the rational part of me knows it was nothing really. I was thinking to myself ‘wow, I really am a mature adult now’ then I remembered it was the only sort of adult thing I’d done since my last doctor’s checkup a few months ago. I guess my monthly blood tests are grown up too, but if a child can do something equally as well as you, maybe that’s a sign you shouldn’t feel too happy with your ‘achievement’? Children can’t drive though. Well, not legally, it does happen…

In the form you fill out, you’d think you’d get asked how much sugar you’re consuming, why are you just asked about smoking and alcohol intake? Sugar is arguably less embarrassing making it an ideal thing to enquire about! Wearing down your teeth with a chisel is rarer behaviour but there are stories about that, and you don’t get asked about that either in the quiz. I guess it would be obvious in the checkup but not beforehand in the questionnaire. As in ‘you’re going to see something pretty messed up when I visit you…’ George Carlin had a standup routine similar to my observation about dental appointment bookings being rather OTT, where he said how much of a fuss people make of getting on airplanes, the difference being I would never book a flight on my own. Way too dangerous, I’d need help from a number of people and I would demand almost nonstop confirmations that everything was nice and legal. In an extreme case I could get sent to jail for being an illegal alien. :O But that’s what travel agents are for, right? The thing is though, I’d take up as much time as at least 10 regular customers, causing definite frustration. Good, I’m frustrated, too!!

Right, I’m back from the dentist! Soon after arriving at the place and waiting in the downstairs waiting room, someone also entered the building and then asked if he had an appointment! He’s worse than me! I’m assuming he got the same amount of reminders as I did, there really are no excuses, there. I was eventually told I was waiting in the wrong area and that I should be waiting upstairs and then in the downstairs waiting room after my first appointment. Complex stuff but I managed it. In the upstairs room, I thought I saw a dentist themed before and after photo, but the pics were literally identical! Then I realised that for whatever reason, the same photo was used twice on purpose, maybe to get a point across? I really have no idea. Soon enough I was called in to get the teeth scraping done. I asked how my teeth were and was told they were pretty good! It was at that point I felt a lot calmer, proving that the following pain wasn’t my main worry, rather how my teeth looked. I learnt a lot about myself in that appointment. Well not really, I suspected that already.

I was also asked if I was fine and I said ‘yes’ even though I wasn’t feeling 100% tiptop. I could have spoke the truth but I thought that was a bit personal and crossing a boundary a little, despite what I said in my recent Alice in Chains review. As I was given some rather effective numbing gel on my teeth and gums, I have to say the whole experience wasn’t very painful at all! Was I given morphine or something? If so, that really is something that should have been discussed with me beforehand. I liked it though. Despite the potent gel, it was still an uncomfortable feeling and I did want to get it over with. When the dentist finally finished her work on my lower teeth, she did my upper ones. Then she did my lower teeth AGAIN! My word! When everything was over I was told some of my gums on my back teeth were receding, but as you can’t see them… doesn’t matter does it? They might as well be black. Well not really, I guess that would cause me a lot of pain, so I will indeed brush my back teeth harder. Sensible Simon!

As I waited for my 2nd appointment downstairs and rightly so that time, I noticed a message on a wall that looked like it was handwritten, but actually it wasn’t. You could tell, as the As, Bs, Cs, etc. were all in the same font. A nice font, though. :) There was only one ‘W’ in the message though, so I couldn’t compare two or more ‘Ws’ which was a shame. There was also only one B, G and F, you have to make the time pass somehow. Everyone else who waited had mobile phones with them, I of course am terrified of losing mine, so it stays snug at home basically ALL the time. When I was called in for my 2nd appointment I was asked how I was again, and I said I was fine again. However, that time I was being more truthful as my mood had picked up. Again, I didn’t think it appropriate to go into details, so I didn’t. My teeth were told they were pretty good a further time which I liked and that was basically the whole appointment over with! I think that has to be a personal record in terms of time, I was only there for about one minute!… And that’s the blog over, bye!