Thursday, September 17, 2009

The Dentist

I don't like the dentist. Don't get me wrong - my dentist is a nice guy. We have some friends who are dentists and they, too, are nice people, but dentists are a confluence of two things I dislike with the intensity of a white hot sun.

(The following will allow you all to look into my psyche and make judgements about my mental health, probably my masculinity and maybe even my sexual orientation. Judge away, assholes.)

I hate squeaky stuff.

Balloons - they should be banned from my house and completely eliminated from the face of the earth.

Balloon animals - there should be an international law forbidding the creation of these horrific monstrosities. For two reasons - the aforementioned squeakiness issue but add to that the fact they are most often created by clowns (which I also intensely dislike) and you have a perfect combination of satanism recruiting tools aimed at our most vulnerable and simple-minded population - children and adults who like clowns.

Green beans - they have to be cooked just right or they squeak on my teeth when I eat them. Butter or olive oil doesn't help. But they can't just have the shit boiled out of them because then they turn all mushy and get that awful gray-green color and all their nutrients (if there are any) are left in the water and I am not about to drink boiled green bean water. My mother-in-law has figured out how to prepare green beans that preserves color and nutrients and prevents squeak. A has also taken to preparing beans this way, but I think it is more time consuming so when we don't have time for the long-version green bean preparation method we use the steam-in-a-bag microwave green bean preparation method and those beans come out squeaky, so I pass.

My father-in-law cutting anything on a plate - there is no cure for this. First of all the guy is damn near deaf, so he can't hear what he is doing. Second of all, even if he could hear and I told him it bothered me he wouldn't care. Yeah, so, when my father-in-law cuts anything on a plate - especially salad - he doesn't just hold the fork in one place and draw the knife along side, he moves the knife and the fork in opposite directions. I am sure in his mind he has determined that this is the most efficient way of cutting food (he was a quality control engineer) but drawing the fork across the plate makes such an irritating screeching sound I have to stop eating because I get this metallic taste in my mouth like I am sucking on an old penny or drinking from one of the water pumps around the lakes here and then I get a migraine and have to go lay down. At least that is what I say happens so I can hide until the dishes are cleared and washed and then I don't have to do anything.

The dentist's drill - the drill itself makes a high pitched whine that my brain interprets as a squeak and then he applies it to my tooth which makes a squeak until it bites into the enamel and then it just sucks. I even hate it when the hygienst polishes my teeth because that damn thing is like listening to my father in law cut his salad while I eat poorly cooked green beans.

Needles!

I really hate needles. Sewing needles. Knitting needles. Pine needles. A needle in a haystack. (Yep, I even hate that cliche.) So there I am, strapped into the dentist's chair (OK not strapped in, but it feels like it) and there he is trying to remain anonymous with his mask on like some sort of soft spoken executioner and he is coming at me with the biggest syringe of novocaine. I mean my god, really, it takes that much?

He then proceeds to hammer this needle the size of a train spike into my gumline. I am ripping the cover off the armrest, stomping my foot and squeezing my eyes shut so tight I can see stars. When he was done injecting my mouth he calmly says, "Everything OK? You had a look of pain on you face." Duh, jackhole! You just stuck the Golden Spike in my lower jaw line.

Yes, he gave me lidocaine to numb the injection site but I am very sensitive. And the fact that it's a needle just makes it hurt to think about it.

Anyway, got my filling and was on my way. My mouth stayed numb for like four hours. I hate that, too.

4 comments:

NJ said...

I'm cringing just reading the dentist encounter. I love going to the dentist for a routine cleaning because of the clean feeling after. I hate fillings. Once I had 3 tiny ones and they were, of course, all in a different location. I ended up with three novocaine shots in three different areas. Needless to say my entire face felt numb for the whole day. It was awful...I feel your pain.

Tasha the Triathlon Goddess said...

HATE the dentist - HATE IT! Yuck. :-( And I have the crappy kind of teeth that no matter how well i take care of them, I still get cavities and all sorts of crap. Yuck.

Btw, I was wondering why in your post about IMMOO you described what I was wearing, but didn't mention that I was clearly dressed as Liberace. THEN I saw yesterday's comment - and duh, it finally dawned on me that when I saw you, I wasn't carrying around the Liberace full-size cutout that was my constant companion that day so people knew who I was and didn't just assume that I escaped from a clown factory. Duh! I'm glad you appreciated the fact that I captured the true essence of Liberace in his uber-flamboyant red-white-blue outfit.....

Whitney said...

Hate the dentist. Which is why I haven't been for about 5 years. Look at me: I can chew; I can talk. Who needs the dentist? Nobody. That's who.

Lisa T said...

Who cuts salad? Come on, really? Salad?