Sunrise, 7:38 a.m. (EST), February 2, 2005. Just north of Barratt's Chapel, on Delaware Route 1.
Wednesday, February 2, 2005
Tuesday, February 1, 2005
An Update: Ouch
Okay. So this crown stuff is not as pain-free as I thought earlier in the day. This is like a lowgrade tooth-ache. On the plus side, I won't have to worry about why I have this toothache. I know why.
In Which I Visit The Dentist To Get My First Crown
This morning I arrived bright and early at the offices of my dentist for the first part of a two-round installation of a crown. My rear-most upper-left molar had simply worn out, if not down, to the point where it had cracks and a bothersome tendency to flex when I chew. That hurt and did not bode well for the long term structural integrity of the tooth.
I see this as a sign of aging and a right of passage, though not a sign of the end of life. I'm 43; this sort of thing is to be expected. I blame years of chewing ice cubes. Mom told me not to. Did I listen? No, I did not.
After about six months of denial, I steeled my courage and went in for the work this morning. Younger readers should understand that, when I was a lad, we didn't have the same level of dental care that you young whipper-snappers enjoy. I learned to dread dental work. It makes no sense now, of course; Drs. Barnhard and Jones, whom I see most often, are as painless as they can be. Even the novacaine shots are painless now.
I know these facts intellectually; on a sub-intellectual level, however, I still harbor some dread. So I was not happy about the prospect.
Of course, the actual hour of work by Dr. B. wasn't too bad. There's a lack of dignity involved; laying back, mouth agape, muscles tensed. It is odd to hear grinding and scraping in the center of your head and see splashes of water and occasional wisps of smoke just visible beyond your nose. Two grown people have both hands deep into your face; wielding drills and mirrors and spray nozzles and vacuum hoses and who knows what else.
So, there is a lack of comfort, but not really any pain.
After the excavation work, Dr. B. built a rudimentary molar to serve as a temporary cover while highly skilled craftsmen sculpt a replica of my former molar. I go back in a few weeks to have that work of art installed in my permanent collection.
I'm left with an odd feeling in my mouth. As the novacaine wears off, there's a slight discomfort (that's a medical term, many of us use the old fashioned "pain"). It is not unlike the sensation that follows a thorough cleaning when you haven't flossed as well as you should have for several months. Certainly not unbearable.
More interesting is that odd sensation of something foreign in my mouth; I remember this from having braces so long ago. It will take some getting used to the new shape of that sector of my mouth. By the time I do, of course, the new crown should be in place and I'll be back to something close to the original layout.
Now I'm back home. I've treated myself to a day off from work. I'll surf the web, Watch some old Monty Python, try to install a WiFi system in the house, visit the library, and enjoy meeting Colleen at the bus this afternoon.
I guess I'll take any excuse to spoil myself.
I see this as a sign of aging and a right of passage, though not a sign of the end of life. I'm 43; this sort of thing is to be expected. I blame years of chewing ice cubes. Mom told me not to. Did I listen? No, I did not.
After about six months of denial, I steeled my courage and went in for the work this morning. Younger readers should understand that, when I was a lad, we didn't have the same level of dental care that you young whipper-snappers enjoy. I learned to dread dental work. It makes no sense now, of course; Drs. Barnhard and Jones, whom I see most often, are as painless as they can be. Even the novacaine shots are painless now.
I know these facts intellectually; on a sub-intellectual level, however, I still harbor some dread. So I was not happy about the prospect.
Of course, the actual hour of work by Dr. B. wasn't too bad. There's a lack of dignity involved; laying back, mouth agape, muscles tensed. It is odd to hear grinding and scraping in the center of your head and see splashes of water and occasional wisps of smoke just visible beyond your nose. Two grown people have both hands deep into your face; wielding drills and mirrors and spray nozzles and vacuum hoses and who knows what else.
So, there is a lack of comfort, but not really any pain.
After the excavation work, Dr. B. built a rudimentary molar to serve as a temporary cover while highly skilled craftsmen sculpt a replica of my former molar. I go back in a few weeks to have that work of art installed in my permanent collection.
I'm left with an odd feeling in my mouth. As the novacaine wears off, there's a slight discomfort (that's a medical term, many of us use the old fashioned "pain"). It is not unlike the sensation that follows a thorough cleaning when you haven't flossed as well as you should have for several months. Certainly not unbearable.
More interesting is that odd sensation of something foreign in my mouth; I remember this from having braces so long ago. It will take some getting used to the new shape of that sector of my mouth. By the time I do, of course, the new crown should be in place and I'll be back to something close to the original layout.
Now I'm back home. I've treated myself to a day off from work. I'll surf the web, Watch some old Monty Python, try to install a WiFi system in the house, visit the library, and enjoy meeting Colleen at the bus this afternoon.
I guess I'll take any excuse to spoil myself.
Sunday, January 30, 2005
Bleah (Part II). Cold Weather (Again). Ice (Again). But No Sick Kids.
Well. Here we are in the midst of another winter storm. At least this time the girls are over what turned out to be a full week of fever, coughing, stuffy noses and general malaise.
Unfortunately, mother nature has let us down in the snow department. We woke this morning to freezing rain and icy sleet. It's too ugly out for my usual digital camera offerings, so I decided to visit the Delaware Department of Transportation traffic camera web page and see what the weather looks like around the rest of the state.
Upstate, in New Castle County, winter looks the way it should.
In Kent County, looks like they got a fair coating of new snow. It's hard to tell if it has stayed snow; this view rather suggests rain. That's the WaWa I often walk to for lunch, by the way.
Here in Sussex County, at least in the east, we see just freezing rain soaking into minor snowfall and a layer of sleet.
It is weather like this that brings up for us the notion of moving our lives to somewhere like Vermont.
Unfortunately, mother nature has let us down in the snow department. We woke this morning to freezing rain and icy sleet. It's too ugly out for my usual digital camera offerings, so I decided to visit the Delaware Department of Transportation traffic camera web page and see what the weather looks like around the rest of the state.
Upstate, in New Castle County, winter looks the way it should.
In Kent County, looks like they got a fair coating of new snow. It's hard to tell if it has stayed snow; this view rather suggests rain. That's the WaWa I often walk to for lunch, by the way.
Here in Sussex County, at least in the east, we see just freezing rain soaking into minor snowfall and a layer of sleet.
It is weather like this that brings up for us the notion of moving our lives to somewhere like Vermont.
Friday, January 28, 2005
A Bad Idea
The brain trust at The Learning Channel has let Paige Davis go from Trading Spaces (In 'Spaces' Makeover, It's Curtains for Paige (Washington Post; Reg. Req.).
A "new creative direction" towards a host-less version of Trading Spaces. Nope. Sorry. That's probably not going to fly.
They lost Vern, but we came back. They lost Ty, and we came back. I think, though, that Paige has an awful lot of fans who probably won't come back.
Give Ms. Davis (actually Mrs. Mindy Paige Davis Page) credit for class, though. Her farewell statement -- posted both on her web site, above, and the TLC site -- takes the high road.
I have to confess that this was in the news earlier than today. I simply had missed it until I came upon a photo with a caption about the firing on the Washington Post web site this evening. It was one in a series of news photos I was flipping through after having enlarged a photo of a glowering VP Cheney in a bulky parka at a Holocaust memorial event in Europe.
A "new creative direction" towards a host-less version of Trading Spaces. Nope. Sorry. That's probably not going to fly.
They lost Vern, but we came back. They lost Ty, and we came back. I think, though, that Paige has an awful lot of fans who probably won't come back.
Give Ms. Davis (actually Mrs. Mindy Paige Davis Page) credit for class, though. Her farewell statement -- posted both on her web site, above, and the TLC site -- takes the high road.
I have to confess that this was in the news earlier than today. I simply had missed it until I came upon a photo with a caption about the firing on the Washington Post web site this evening. It was one in a series of news photos I was flipping through after having enlarged a photo of a glowering VP Cheney in a bulky parka at a Holocaust memorial event in Europe.
Thursday, January 27, 2005
Looks Like They'll Be More Careful This Time
Molly Murray has two stories in today's News Journal on the issue of dredged-up archeological artifacts. In the main story, Beach work mindful of artifacts, she discusses the various precautions planned by the state and by the US Corps of Engineers as they prepare to dredge sand from the ocean floor to replenish Delaware's Atlantic beaches.
There's also a companion piece, Lewes artifacts may be from 2 sites, which looks at what has been learned from the artifacts that were accidentally dredged-up from the Delaware Bay floor late last year.
As a Lewes resident, and with some interest in history and archeology, I've been watching this story and posting links to coverage of it in the past few months. There's at least one person out there with strong feeling about this issue. He, or she, prefers to remain anonymous in his, or her, comments. And they are fairly strong comments.
I hope my anonymous commenter will take some comfort from the precautions outlined in Molly's longer piece this morning. I believe that the folks running these dredging programs are trying to avoid a repeat of what happened off Lewes Beach and I give them credit for their efforts.
It may be because I am a state employee. It may also be because I worked for several years with some of the DNREC players in this story back in the early 1990s. But I have to say that I am confident that the people at DNREC, and even the feds on this project, are not evil people. They are people, and they are trying to do their jobs, serve the people of the state and protect the environment and the heritage of the state.
Stuff happens. There are always mistakes in life. What would be a problem is if we didn't try to learn from our mistakes and avoid repeating them.
There's also a companion piece, Lewes artifacts may be from 2 sites, which looks at what has been learned from the artifacts that were accidentally dredged-up from the Delaware Bay floor late last year.
As a Lewes resident, and with some interest in history and archeology, I've been watching this story and posting links to coverage of it in the past few months. There's at least one person out there with strong feeling about this issue. He, or she, prefers to remain anonymous in his, or her, comments. And they are fairly strong comments.
I hope my anonymous commenter will take some comfort from the precautions outlined in Molly's longer piece this morning. I believe that the folks running these dredging programs are trying to avoid a repeat of what happened off Lewes Beach and I give them credit for their efforts.
It may be because I am a state employee. It may also be because I worked for several years with some of the DNREC players in this story back in the early 1990s. But I have to say that I am confident that the people at DNREC, and even the feds on this project, are not evil people. They are people, and they are trying to do their jobs, serve the people of the state and protect the environment and the heritage of the state.
Stuff happens. There are always mistakes in life. What would be a problem is if we didn't try to learn from our mistakes and avoid repeating them.
Tuesday, January 25, 2005
I'm Not Sure Why I Noticed This, But...
When you hold a logo pen in your left hand, the logo is upside down. Are we writing-off left-handed folks when we market by pen? Or are southpaws simply used to this sort of thing?
Monday, January 24, 2005
An Icy Day
I had a meeting this afternoon at the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control -- DNREC -- where I started my career as a state employee many, many years ago. DNREC's offices are in a converted factory complex and surround a very pleasant courtyard.
Today the eaves along the perimeter were sheathed in ice and sported impressive icicles. Of course, I had to take a photo or two.
Today the eaves along the perimeter were sheathed in ice and sported impressive icicles. Of course, I had to take a photo or two.
Bleah. Cold Weather. Ice. Sick Kids.
Here we are with temperatures outside down at about 10 degrees and kids inside running high fevers and coughing away. There is a sheet of ice over all outdoors. What fun.
At least state government offices are opening late, so I can stay home and help with the first hour or so of nursing. I guess I'll try to clear my calendar this week so I can take a few full day's of sick-kid duty.
At least state government offices are opening late, so I can stay home and help with the first hour or so of nursing. I guess I'll try to clear my calendar this week so I can take a few full day's of sick-kid duty.
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