Ow.

Yesterday I got to experience something that I hadn't in thirteen years. I got to go to the dentist.

While not a pleasant experience, it wasn't horrible. They did chastize me for not coming in sooner, forcing me to play the "I didn't have insurance/too expensive" trump card. I was complimented on my oral hygiene, but I did have some tartar buildup and a couple of cavities - not bad for thirteen years of dental malfeasance. Not good, either, but certainly not as bad as something you'd find in the Big Book of British Smiles.

The appoinment began with the dental hygenist rubbing some cherry flavoured goo on my gumline. This both numbed my gums and left me with a pleasant Nyquil™ cherry-death flavour in my mouth. After they randomly selected a time, I was given several injections of novacaine from a syringe roughly the size and heft of a California redwood. After several minutes, the entire right side of my face - including my right nostril - went completely numb. For the cleaning, they brought out what amounted to an ultrasonic water-pik. This procedure - while not painful - did produce a constant buzzing inside my headbones.

After this, it was time to move on to the filling of the cavities. After moving me to another chair, the drill was fired up and the attack on the decaying enamel began. There was a tense moment where, when the novacaine started wearing off, it began to feel as though they were drilling directly into the nerves in my jaw. I raised my hand and waved to get their attention:
Me: "hrghfph!!!!!" (hey, it's hard to talk with two hands and assorted tools in your mouth)
Them (calmly, as they remove their hands): "Yes?"
Me: "I think the...ow...novacaine's wearing off..."
At this point, they looked at each other briefly - a hint of malice glinting in their eyes - and once again foisted the syringe and gave me another shot. This time, the sucker skipped my soft tissues completely, and went directly for the lower mandible. Various epithets, slurs, and vague insinuations went through my head but I couldn't vocalize them. It's damned impossible to speak when half your face is numb and two dental hygenists have their hands stuffed so far in your mouth that they're tickling your uvula.

But I survived. I arrived home with a face full of novacaine, and a dull ache in my jaw. Once the novacaine wore off the ache intensified to a throb, waited for a bit, then went straight into intense pain. I attributed this partly to the freshly patched holes in my teeth, but mostly to the stab to the jawbone.

The good news is that my teeth are a little better off than they were two days ago. The bad?
I get to go back and do this a second time in late June...