Word to the wise

I'm back, with four fewer teeth, but hopefully still retaining some wisdom. If I had any to begin with.

I want to start by marveling a bit at sedation dentistry. It works so well, it's a little disconcerting. It requires such deep faith in a doctor you've probably met twice at most and know next to nothing about.

Doctor: "I'm going to put you to sleep, but I swear, I'll wake you back up. And in between, I'm going to yank some teeth out of your head, but I promise not to harm you in any other way, or steal the contents of your purse, even though, let's face it, how would you know?"

Patient: "Ok, doc, whatever you say. Please shoot me full of unknown drugs, I see no conceivable way this could end badly."

Scary, huh?

But, that's pretty much what happened. I hopped into the chair, they strapped my arms down (I guess sedated patients sometimes flail, try to punch the dentist, etc.), and in the IV went. I felt a little light-headed, and the next thing I knew, I was waking up again, IV gone and a mouth full of bloody gauze.

I'm sorry to say that as far as I know, I didn't do anything spectacularly funny--I didn't try to carry on a conversation with an inanimate object, engage in a game of charades with my own shadow, or sing show tunes into a dental apparatus masquerading as a microphone. Not that I enjoy embarrassing myself, but those kinds of stories are always fun to share after the fact. But alas, I'm not that interesting. The best I could do was nab a photo of myself, slightly puffed up and woozy, waiting for the pharmacist to dispense my drugs:

Pretty, huh?

(I don't wear my glasses often, what do you think? Try to imagine them without the chipmunk cheeks and dilated pupils.)

I've been laid up for a few days, though I'm not in severe pain. I took my vicodin the first day, but since then, regular pain killers have been keeping things in check. The main problem is that I'm exhausted, and the soft food diet isn't exactly fulfilling my nutritional or caloric needs. My inner child was really excited about eating ice cream for every meal, but Adult Kristen got over it real quickly. My diet for the last few days has consisted of primarily soup, mashed potatoes, eggs and V8 juice--and trying to eat them slowly, while keeping tiny bits and morsels out of my wounds makes dining decidedly miserable. So far I've managed to lose 4 pounds, despite barely moving all week, so I guess if you're looking for a quick diet plan, this might work for you. Hopefully by this weekend I can graduate to, you know, chewing.

I have been doing some knitting--not as much as I had hoped because knitting almost feels like exercise, but I've made some decent progress on a few different projects. Now, if I go hunting for the camera, I might be attacked by a spontaneous nap, so here's an iPhone grab of the knitting situation surrounding me:

There's a baby sweater, a camisole and a sock in there, plus a hat pattern I haven't actually cast on yet. I'd better get to work, because if I don't complete at least one project, the surprise oral surgery and ensuing "vacation" will have been wasted.