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Gary Gygax

Gary Gygax was called home to the Blessed Fields of Elysium yesterday. He will be missed.

Tags: D&D, Gaming, mourning

Valentines Day 2008

Throbbing sinuses
Drills screeching away
Constant vibration
Flying bits of tooth dust
Burnt scent wafting upwards

As mentioned previously, I broke a tooth. So I got to spend a good chunk of Valentines day in the dentist's office getting a temporary crown installed, but for extra fun I woke up with a massive sinus headache. I refused to take anything for the headache before I went to the dentist as I didn't want to risk any weird drug interaction issues with the anesthetic the dentist used on me. When I went in for my appointment and was taken past the waiting room, I noticed we were going towards a different part of the dentist's office then I'd been in for my initial examination. I commented to that this must be the way to the punishment rooms. The dentist laughed but did not deny my allegation. I was setup in a chair, had some nasty mint numbing medication rubbed into my gums, given multiple injections of the anesthetic, watched the Colbert Report on a small LCD TV they had overhead; while they drilled, ground, scrapped and poked around in my mouth. When they were all done, I had three new fillings in my teeth as well as the temporary crown. All in all, it has to be the least romantic Valentines day I can remember.

I'd really like to end this post with a bright side, but I just can't quite think of one at the moment. The closest I can come up with is I've learned my lesson and will be making regular visits to the dentist in the future. Hopefully those regular visits will allow me to avoid this sort of fun in the future.

Tags: crown, dentist, fillings, valentines

What a Week!

I know, I know. It's only Tuesday; how bad could it be? Well....

Sunday night while eating dinner, I bit down on something. It felt hard and crunchy. A moment later I felt something poking the side of my tongue, kind of like I had something stuck in between my teeth and my gums. I couldn't get the offending poky bit free with my tongue. I got up went into the bathroom, looked in the mirror and realized the crunchy bit was likely part of a tooth.

Monday, I tried making an appointment to see a dentist. No, not my dentist. I hadn't been to a dentist in years as my teeth never bothered me. I do brush and floss regularly, so I left the dental checkups at the bottom of my priority list. Part of the reason it was so far down my list is... frankly, I hate going to the dentist. The most pleasant possible outcome of going to the dentist is being told you don't have cavities and then you walk out with that weird uber smooth feeling to your teeth. Bah.

Tuesday, I hadn't heard back from the dentist's office. Yesterday I'd submitted a request for an appointment via their website. But since I hadn't heard anything and I was tired of my busted tooth poking my tongue, I called them. I was able to get myself an afternoon appointment and headed over at the appropriate time. Oh and about an hour before I started over to their office; snow in large quantities started to fall. [INSERT CURSING HERE] I got over to their office in plenty of time and started filling out the paperwork. All the staff at the office were unfailing polite and helpful but it didn't make me feel much better about being there. After a short wait, I was taken into the back and had my teeth examined by a dental hygienist.

I have to say things have changed in the years since I've been to a dentist. Now the x-ray machine is digital and they have a computer monitor attached to the patient's chair to display the x-ray. Also they've got a digital camera about the size of a ballpoint pen used to take photos of your teeth. Side note: eeeew, cavities and broken teeth look terrible blown up in full color on computer monitors. They also have a new diagnostic tool which measures the density of the tooth to determine if there's a cavity (and to tell if the cavity is bad enough to need fixing).

The end result of all this new technology is I got to see how bad my teeth are. How bad are they? Well, I'll be getting 3 fillings and a crown. Wheee!

*sob, sob*

Tags: crown, dentist, teeth

I Stood For My Candidate, Did You Stand For Yours?

For the first time since I became a registered voter, I attended my local caucus. I was registered as an independent prior to going out tonight, so when I arrived I got in line and changed my registration to the Democratic party. That was about 6 PM and for the next 2 hours I was standing around in a school gym chatting with some neighbors and some strangers. It was loud, hot and crowded.

I think the official count of registered voters attending the caucus for our district was 355, which according to the caucus chairman that's a new record. Around the walls of the gym were posters for several of the candidates: Biden, Clinton, Dodd, Edwards and Obama. Once things got a bit more organized, they caucus workers had us all line up in groups for them to count the number of supporters for each candidate. The first count determined which candidates were viable, to do this each candidate needed to have at least 50 supporters. Biden and Dodd were both eliminated at this stage. It looked like those supporters both switched over to Edwards but with all the people crowded into the gym, I can't be sure about that. There were multiple, repeated recounts and at the end Obama had 206 supporters from our district. Most people (including us) left at this point, as we were told all that was left to do at the caucus was to fill out some official paperwork and to elect the delegates to go to the county convention. We didn't have any interested in going to the county convention, so we headed home at that point.

It was an interesting experience but not what I was expecting. I had thought each candidate would have a representative who'd have an opportunity to speak to try convincing people to switch to their candidate. That didn't happen. In fact, the closest thing we had to that were supporters for the various candidates starting to chant for their candidate, e.g. I say "O", you say "Bama". "O"! "Bama"! "O"! "Bama"!

Having been home for a while now, I see Obama won the Iowa Democractic Caucus. I wish him good luck in the other states and hope he wins.

Tags: caucus, democrats, Politics

7 Things My Wife Should Know

Inspired by 50 Things Men Wish You Knew.

1. Talk to me and tell me what you think; your thoughts and ideas are important to me. But keep in mind there's a time and place for everything. This means my bathroom has a closed door policy and when it's closed I'm in no mood to listen.
2. You look hot in (or out of anything) you want to wear. This can make it difficult for me to help you pick out an outfit. I can help you out, it's just I will want to you be prepared to take it off. Repeatedly. Slowly.
3. A random unexpected grope is always welcome, even in public. Especially when I'm the one doing the groping.
4. Sometimes the crankier, old man inside of me gets the better of my cranky, old man exterior and I take my bad attitude out on you. I don't intend for it to happen and so I'll apologize for it here now. Sorry.
5. When I screw up, go ahead and tell me right away. My poor memory is part of my coping mechanism for dealing with an imperfect world. I forget all my screw-ups as quickly as I can, so I won't remember it when you bring it up six months later.
6. Shopping is a mission where specific target(s) must be acquired as quickly as possible. We go in and we get out. If you only wish to perform reconnaissance and information gathering on the target(s), be sure that objective is made clear during the mission briefing.
7. There are a variety of physical traits that I find attractive. What I find even more attractive is when I can tell you are feeling confident and sexy.

Tags: humour, Lists, Wife