Tag Archives: 365project2015

335/365. this is bananas! more adventures with a cadaver bone graft.

335/365. this is bananas! more adventures with a cadaver bone graft.

while i was talking on a phone call at work with a lot of participants, the stitches came unstitched and the membrane holding the cadaver bone graft to my mandible popped out. i think i spontaneously muttered something like, “oh [BLEEP], something just fell out my mouth,” to everyone on the call.

it’s not clear if I swallowed the cadaver graft 🙁

soooooo, back to oral surgeon tomorrow. in an uncharacteristic display of restraint I won’t take a picture of membrane.

with a gaping hole in my mouth, i’m back to diet consisting entirely of mushy bananas and yogurt.

still no pain though!

334/365. not really sure what i think about our charlie brown-ish christmas tree.

334/365. not really sure what i think about our charlie brown-ish christmas tree.

after many years of having full, white pines for christmas trees we brought back a fir from the upper peninsula, partly because of the fond memories we have of living in the pacific northwest and christmas with noble firs.

but this one reminds me of the sad christmas tree in the “a charlie brown christmas”. or maybe i just need to give it a chance?

333/365. my atypical pain response gets curiouser and curiouser.

333/365. my atypical pain response gets curiouser and curiouser.

after my oral surgeon described my pain response as “atypical” i was curious to see if i’d feel any pain after the tooth extraction. the oral surgeon gave me some high strength ibuprofen and hydrocodone and though it was very likely i would not be going to work the next day as the tooth didn’t come out easily. “you might be able to go to work for part of the day,” the oral surgeon said, “but have the pain medicine with you and i hope you don’t have to talk too much.”

i decided that rather than proactively taking the meds to prevent the pain that i thought would come, that i’d wait and see. would the pain arrive?

no, it did not. i went to work with a visibly swollen cheek bone from the extraction, one less tooth and no pain. and i did a good amount of talking. not only did i not feel any pain, but i think i feel in some sense better than before the extraction but it’s hard to describe “how” the better feels.

which explains why i’m just staring at the pain meds i’m not taking thinking about the qualia of pain.

332/365. wherein i learn i’m atypical.

332/365. wherein i learn i’m atypical.

what’s more fun than a a root canal? going through a root canal and then learning it didn’t work so you have to have the tooth extracted and a cadaver bone graft put in place to help build the “significant” ( word choice of the oral surgeon ) amount of bone loss you’ve suffered from the infection that’s been raging in your mandible ( as if the prospect of getting my skeleton worked on isn’t weird enough, i will now have the first what might be several bone grafts from a cadaver in my jaw ).

like everyone else, the oral surgeon was surprised i have not felt any pain which is the normal early indicator of an infection in your tooth and helps signal something is wrong before it spreads to your jaw and beyond. “yeah, you’re atypical”

i’ll try not to ruminate too much on why i’m not feeling any pain. or what other types of pain i might not be feeling ( after marathons, i feel tired for sure, but not painful per se ). what is pain? do i process some sorts of pain differently than others? or maybe i do feel pain but i’ve gotten really good at ignoring it?

day 4166 – 331/365. ’tis the season for a hockey double header!

day 4166 - 331/365. ’tis the season for a hockey double header!

we drove back from the upper peninsula of michigan and turn around the next day and drive 35 miles for a double header hockey game against onalaska.

odin’s team won the first game, 3-9, with 22 shots on goal to their 16 shots on goal and they tied the second game against the same team 7-7, with 33 shots on goat to their 23 shots on goal.

rumor has it onalaska was not expecting to lose by 6 points the first game so they had fire in their bellies for the second game. congrats to both teams for a great games.

i have to say, odin did a good job but he was off a bit and didn’t play his best games. i think vacation sleep schedule, the drive and quick turnaround took a toll on him.

day 4165 – 330/365. odin demonstrates his advanced card house building skills.

day 4165 - 330/365. odin demonstrates his advanced card house building skills.

post thanksgiving hanging-out with family and odin decides he wants to build a card house. he’s pretty good at building them as we’ve been doing it for many years, but i was skeptical he could build one sturdy enough to stay standing after stacking magazines and books on top of it.

i thought it would topple after the first magazine. nope. ok, but surely it wouldn’t remain standing under a thin book and a magazine? it stood. how about a magazine, a thin book and several hundred pages of theodore roosevelt’s “the wilderness hunter”? IT STILL STOOD!

at this point everyone was so amazed that the dogs had to come check out what was going on. it did not still stand.

( he’s looking a serious here because it’s the fourth shot i’ve taken and he’s a little Over IT. )