Friday, April 17, 2009

The Patch-a-thon, phase VI

Yesterday, I tried out a new dentist, for my dear ol' reliable dentist is en route to retirement, and has foisted me off on the sweet young "partners" he's brought on board for that purpose.

Not sure that's working for me.

Anyway, I also wanted a dentist who wasn't into mercury fillings, for I've been hearing about how bad they are for one for a while now, but will spare you the details. (This from a gal who watched mercury skitter across her 6th-grade classroom floor with unfettered glee, thanks to a clumsy classmate and a thermometer, but I digress.)

So, I went to a "biological" dentist up in Greenfield. Entered a nice waiting room that was blaring The River (heard Kelsey Flynn as I walked into the office, which I took as a good sign). Picture of the dentist and his dog on the wall (another good sign). There were many delays seeing said dentist (not so good sign), but the staff said this was very unusual, but they had a lot of emergencies. In fact, they said that it felt like a full moon day, for they get a lot more emergency patients on full moon days than any other. (I thought ERs just had that issue, but aparently not.)

But I got to watch a lot of birds and a number of enterprising squirrels at a feeder while I waited, so I was okay. They even gave me a birdwatcher's guide to while away the time. Nice.

Then the dentist came along, and he had a soul patch. That is not something one expects in a dentist, but there it was. Odd. He also referred to Linda as my "friend," even though I referred to her as my partner and my spouse. Slightly irritating. (Not so good sign.)

But he thinks I may have a cavity under a filling and he can fix that, and he had some interesting ideas re Linda's treatment, so I'll be back.

The jury's still out, but let's give them a chance, shall we? And I always like a nice drive up to Greenfield. Almost lived there, but that's a story for another day. Now I must go juice....

Saturday, April 11, 2009

If one must fall off the wagon.....

No, I didn't fall off that wagon, but I did fall off the highly restricted food plan I've been on thanks to Linda's latest treatment. It is a vegetarian diet with little variety--and no berries! (Very, very hard to walk by strawberries, which have begun showing up in the store.)

Anyway, the only bread is a salt-free rye bread, which has a sourdough base. It's nutritious. It's no-nonsense. It's something I imagine a Russian army or two would have marched 1,000 miles on. It's just not tasty.

So today, after taking care of three errands in one fell swoop (mailing our taxes, depositing our checks and making copies for Linda), I thought I could use a treat. Thought about the Cup and Top in downtown Florence (where I ran all errands in record time), but the line was ridiculous. So I hopped in the car and drove up to Bread Euphoria, where I not only scored a delicious cinnamon bun, I was hugged by a baker (friend Sarah, to be more specific) and met the partner of another gal named Sarah who I have known casually for about as long as I have lived up here.

Delightful!

Didn't tell Linda about the treat, for I don't think it's fair. Sarah (the baker) said my secret is safe with her, so I'm counting on your discretion (she hasn't read this blog in eons).

Anyway, the only other news is that our pipes sprang another leak. (The first being while we were in Mexico. Lovely, that.) Our regular plumber didn't have an emergency number, so I ended up calling Mr. Rooter.

That worked, actually! (Sure it cost a lot more than our regular plumber, but now I don't have to listen to the drip, drip, drip in the bucket. Worth a lot, that.)