And then Laure showed up anyway! She said that she had been too tired and grumpy from a day without air-conditioning to face meeting other people. But when she got my e-mail that the other people were not coming, and that I was "just going to go home and sing anyway and drink the beer and eat the cheese and crackers I'd bought for my guests" she called and asked if she could still come over.
We chatted and harmonized for a couple of hours, (and drank Dos Equis and ate cheese and crackers) and it was lovely!
Scheduling the music jam also motivated me to make five copies of the song booklet of old favorites which I'd compiled to use for my own practicing. Since I've been using it to practice with, I've realized that the same "collection" might be ideal for family music get-togethers, and much more packable than the big songbooks. The booklets each have two packets in a folder, and each packet has around 15 songs in it, with a table of contents on the front.
A couple of years ago, Kevin Gee gave me a piece of their tall many-armed "twisting" cactus, and that piece just bloomed! Too bad cactus blossoms bloom and die in just one day.
I had a good dentist visit Monday morning the 5th, but the rest of the day I was worried and agitated. Why? A call to the periodontist's, made at a coffee shop stop right after the dentist appointment, revealed that the huge check I'd sent to pre-pay for Thursday's gum surgery had not yet been credited to my account! I felt so stupid for sending a cashier's check through the mails. I visited the bank where I have my savings account to buy large cashier's checks and money orders needed for homeowner's insurance, my secured credit card payment, Ann for the airline tickets to India. I did little else for the rest of the day and evening than to watch one of the British DVDs I'd bought at Costco when I stopped that huge, crowded bustling place to order some photo prints. I went to bed too late and woke up at 3:00AM unable to sleep.
It was a huge relief when the periodontist's office called early Tuesday morning, even before they opened, to say that they found the check! I went back to sleep for an hour and a half because I'd slept so little. The rest of the day was my usually busy Tuesday, getting drama papers ready, going to my weekly Arabic lesson at my tutor's apartment in Mesa, making copies for drama club, going to the Boys & Girls Club and finding out that drama club was not scheduled, going to the Apache Junction library just down the road from there and printing invoice from Intrepid Travel for the India trip, and e-mailing their U.S. agent about arranging extra hotel rooms at the beginning and end of the tour, yoga. I started to watch "The Great Train Robbery" but didn't make it through ten minutes of it!
Wednesday I finally (it's been three years) had an eye appointment, and was so glad to find out that my prescription has changed little and that I have apparently not damaged my eyes with that three years of not wearing glasses. We got to the gym in time to have a good cardio session and still get to my 8:00 eye appointment on time. Dale Sr. drove me home because the dilation made driving in the Arizona summer sun next to impossible. The dilation drug seemed to put me rather "under the weather" and hours later I was still over-reacting to sunlight. I was relieved that my friend Alba canceled our afternoon coffee date, though we had a nice chat on the phone. Another on the list of friends whom I hadn't seen all this busy spring.
I spent the rest of the day indoors watching the remainder of "The Great Train Robbery" which I highly recommend. It is divided into "A Robber's Tale" and "A Copper's Tale". I've never seen Jim Broadbent play a character that "together", he's usually playing lovable losers. And actor Luke Evans was mesmerizing as the young mastermind of the robbery, leader of a gang of young South London criminals who had all gone to school together.
By the evening I felt recovered enough to sing through the first half of my song compilation, and enjoyed it. I really like having the songs in a "singable order" instead of alphabetically.
Wednesday I finally (it's been three years) had an eye appointment, and was so glad to find out that my prescription has changed little and that I have apparently not damaged my eyes with that three years of not wearing glasses. We got to the gym in time to have a good cardio session and still get to my 8:00 eye appointment on time. Dale Sr. drove me home because the dilation made driving in the Arizona summer sun next to impossible. The dilation drug seemed to put me rather "under the weather" and hours later I was still over-reacting to sunlight. I was relieved that my friend Alba canceled our afternoon coffee date, though we had a nice chat on the phone. Another on the list of friends whom I hadn't seen all this busy spring.
I spent the rest of the day indoors watching the remainder of "The Great Train Robbery" which I highly recommend. It is divided into "A Robber's Tale" and "A Copper's Tale". I've never seen Jim Broadbent play a character that "together", he's usually playing lovable losers. And actor Luke Evans was mesmerizing as the young mastermind of the robbery, leader of a gang of young South London criminals who had all gone to school together.
By the evening I felt recovered enough to sing through the first half of my song compilation, and enjoyed it. I really like having the songs in a "singable order" instead of alphabetically.
The Thursday surgery was, as expected, quite traumatic, and as I write this blog the following Tuesday, my face is still throbbing. As with the December part of the procedure, it seemed like I was given around 15 anesthetic shots, skillfully administered all around my upper and lower gums, but painful.The body rather goes into what feels a bit like shock, much as I concentrated on staying relaxed. Dr. Whetstone was very careful about making sure I was numb enough, adding a couple more shots of anesthetic later during the procedure because probes revealed that I was not completely numb up in the connective tissue. I found that I trusted him implicitly.
The ordeal was helped a bit by the personality interchange between the tall, athletic youngish periodontist and his assistant, the photographer, and a young intern girl, lots of jokes. The procedure is quite something, called "the tunnel procedure". Two slivers of flesh are removed from the connecting tissue at the top sides of the roof of the mouth. A tunnel is made in the gum under the very front teeth, and the slivers are pulled through it using what looks like red fishing line. Once the slivers are stuffed in there, short row of stitches is left on each sides of this tunnel, and also along the top left and right right below the inside of the teeth where the connective tissue was removed.
When I heard him refer to the first sliver of flesh as "fish bait" in an aside to the intern, I asked in my mealy-mouthed way, to see it. Sure enough, it looked like a 1/2" long, 1/4" in diameter sliver of salmon-colored raw chicken meat, hanging from its red fishing line.
The amazing thing is that the bit of tissue which is stuffed into the lower jaw will graft on to what is already there and continue to be living tissue. Most amazing of all, the place where it has been taken from will regenerate more! He said that the good thing was that I had plenty of connective tissue up there, whereas some patients have little more than a millimeter.
I asked him who invented the procedure, and he said "You know, I don't know. But I've been using it more and more because I get such good results with it." In spite of the pain, I am so grateful that someone invented it, and also that I can afford to have it done...(around $3,000 for the December part and $5,000 for what I just had done.)
This is me with my swollen, bruised Marlon-Brando-as-the-Godfather jaw, the following day.
In some ways recuperation from this procedure is easier than from the December one, and in some ways more difficult. ln this second half of the procedure, all the "wounds" are stitched up, unlike the December procedure where large areas had to grow back onto the teeth on their own.This means I only had to stick to soup one day, then I could go right to the mushy food like mashed potatoes and gravy.
The down side is that there was much more pain in the following afternoon and the following day, than in the December procedure. especially in my lower front jaw. Not surprising when you realize that the lower front gums have been ask to stretch around quite a bit of new tissue.
The assistant had given me a prescription for an opiate painkiller "just in case" but I was so glad that I insisted that we stop at Safeway on the way home and get it filled. The pain grew so bad first day, that during the last hour of each four-hour pill, I was counting the minutes until I could take it again. It would have been really difficult to go get the prescription filled after the pain got that bad. And it was in the class of drugs which is a controlled substance, someone else cannot get filled for you, you have to sign for it yourself. Also, you cannot drive a vehicle while you are on it.
Dale Sr. had made me some delicious butternut squash soup, but he hadn't finished making it yet, so I bought several canned soups at Safeway and blended them. What is surprising is that, not having eaten canned soup for years, I can't see now how I ever thought it was any good! A simple homemade potato cream soup with melted cheese in it is so much better! Canned soup just tastes so canned!
I stopped the opioid painkillers at noon the following day, and switched to the prescription strength Ibuprofen. I still had quite a lot of pain, as the anti-inflammatory pills were tapered off it seemed like the pain even got a little worse. I re-watched a lot of old DVDs, the whole first season of "As Time Goes By", and "The Syndicate: All or Nothing" (which I also loved).
Saturday morning we had to go to our dear friend Marilyn's memorial for her mother. I put makeup over my bruises, found something pretty but comfortable to wear, popped a prescription-strength Ibuprofen, and we went. I did all right, in fact I did just fine. It is a beautiful church (I always think the statues of the saints make a Catholic church look more homey than a Protestant church), and there was an incredibly good singer as part of the service. At the lunch afterward in the Catholic church social room, itwas fun talking to Judy Venuta who has been part of the Jerome Halloween weekend the last two years and who keeps inviting me to the Democratic women's group. But when Marilyn invited us to stop by her home with the rest of her family and close friends at the end of the lunch, I realized I was completely tired out. And I was hungry, there had been no mushy stuff to eat at the buffet at all!
Below, Marilyn reads a poem as part of the service.
Below: Judy Venuta, Marilyn Giannone, and Jerry Gargalione.
Sunday I did little else besides the two things that one can't ignore (going through bills and watering dry plants). I just lay in bed watching more old DVD's. In the evenings I cleaned myself up and went to Starbuck's to check e-mail and check in with my anti-obesity group. I have gone from taking one prescription-strength Ibuprofen a day to none at all, and yesterday I did a couple hours of gardening. So things are better. There is still enough throbbing in my face to make me pretty grumpy, but it feels better to me not to depend on pain medication. Also, having to put everything in the blender before I eat it is getting pretty "old". I feel like I've washed that thing a hundred times!
I did take one Ibuprofen before I went up to do Drama Club today. Actually I didn't have to do the club, because the activities director got a promotion to a bigger club. I arranged with the interim director to start up the club on the 20th, because this Thursday I'll be flying to Berkeley. I also walked around talking to kids and telling them what drama was and that we would be starting in a week. Now I'm at the library, doing this blog and the Ibuprofen is still keeping me without pain.
Love, Lennie
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