Dentist Appointments

10:52 PM

What an excellent day. My dad woke me up at around 6 AM because I would be borrowing his car to take to the dentist later at 11 AM. We only have two cars, and both my parents use them for their work, so to be able to borrow one, I have to drop my dad off and pick him up again later.

I woke up grumpy. It's so weird how our emotions can be so different depending on the context. I'm usually a very calm person, but I was pissed off this morning. This happens a lot when I'm woken up early. Everything I think and say in this state is somehow negative and angry sounding, and I'm yelling unintentionally but automatically as my default speaking voice. I wouldn't be able to say "what great weather" because I would be too angry to think that. Our moods can cloud our view of the world.

The calm state I'm in right now is only possible because I'm not grumpy, because I'm not fatigued. Instead of feeling angry at being awake, I feel elated that I'm awake. I just came back from the gym like an hour or two ago, and I did some tiring workouts, and then I ate a bunch of vegetables and a beyond burger, some protein powder, and some kiwis, so yeah I feel amazing right now.

Anyway, I drop my dad off, and I'm pretty pissed at him the whole time while driving. I can only be upset and angry in this state, so I just had negative thoughts the whole time. Every time I spoke it was basically to argue for no reason with my dad. I love my dad, I think he's great, but I only had the worst thoughts of him on this drive. We argued and yelled at each other in the car too. We have these fights all the time and then we always make up afterwards. Anyway, I drop him off, and then I drive back home.

At home, I know I have to drive out again to go to the dentist soon, so I get to work. I start working, and also eat at the same time. I managed to complete a decent amount of work before my dentist appointment at 11, and then I drove off after submitting the work I completed for review.

I go to the dentist and they numb the left side of my face by injecting anesthesia to my top and bottom gums. The syringe they used looked thicker than your standard needle. They inject my gums multiple times, starting from the side, and then coming closer and closer to the front. It's most painful at the front, I'd describe the injection as sort of a pinching pain, which I could tolerate, but my eyes automatically cried tears even though I was baring it just fine. It's interesting that the body does that.

A few minutes later the entire left side of my cheek area and nose became numb. The sensation of my nose feeling numb was weird, I felt like it was drooling snot the whole time, when in reality I just lacked any feeling from it. The left side of my face also drooped. I couldn't control my mouth muscles very well at all. The left side of my lips drooped and I couldn't feel anything when I bit down.

Anyway, the dentist started the procedure of deep cleaning my teeth. I thought it was $200 per side, but it was actually $200 per quadrant. It was actually a pretty quick procedure, probably just around 30-40 minutes, and then that was done. The left side of my face was 2 quadrants, so I paid $400 at the front. The desk attendant also thought it was $200 per side, so she said I could pay for both now, or $200 now and $200 later. I said I'd just pay for both now. It turns out it's $200 per quadrant, and I paid $400 now, and I have to pay another $400 later (but I'd get a discount, we'll get to that).

I drive back home and the entire left side of my face is drooping. It felt weird. I couldn't smile normally, if I tried to smile, it's like the left side of my face wouldn't, so it was like a half smile sort of. It was so weird. As I type this, I have full control of my face again, so I can smile properly now, but when they were numbed. it's as if I couldn't control my face at all.

At home, I continued to work. I couldn't eat anymore because my mouth was numb, and I'd have another appointment later that day anyway. So I just worked.

I'd also check my teeth and mouth in the mirror. Yeah it was nice that my left teeth had all of the tartar removed. There was a subtle but visible difference between the left side of my teeth and the right side. My tartar actually turned yellowish whitish, so it blended in with the teeth, but there were also some tiny darkish yellowish areas that I couldn't get rid of just by brushing. It was pretty hard to tell the difference, you really had to look, but it was there.

The work I submitted earlier passed, and I started moving some items to their staging server for them to test. I also did work on another work project as well and got a decent amount done.

At around 2 PM, I picked up my dad, and drove him back. Then I just continued working. I worked on the "carousel" feature where you click on an area and it expands. It's pretty simple to make, but I had to format it in a certain way, and I got that done. Mostly done. It still doesn't look perfect but I think it's fine for now.

At around 4 PM, I drove back to the dentist again to get the right side of my mouth done. When I got in, they explained to me that it was actually $200 per quadrant, not $200 per side, and there were 4 quadrants, so it costs $800 to do a deep cleaning for my entire mouth. I accepted that, and got my deep cleaning done on the right side. Hopefully this means my teeth are far healthier now. I do feel good right now. The dentist gave me a discount because she said there wasn't as much work to be done on the right side, so I only had to pay $125 per quadrant on the right. So my total was around $650 for a deep cleaning of my teeth.

It's the same story with the numbness on the right side. The entire right side of my face drooped and I couldn't control my facial muscles for it. When I smiled, the right side of my face would droop. It was weird. My left side still wasn't fully free from numbness at this point, but it was mostly through.

Anyway, I resume working and then stop at around 7 PM. I also shopped on eBay for a bit and bought myself an Apple Watch Ultra 2. It's just something I've been wanting to have for over a year now, and I thought they were going to come out with the Apple Watch Ultra 3 this year, so I waited. Well they didn't, so I just bought a barely used, excellent condition Apple Watch Ultra 2 for $475. The band was never worn, the charger was never taken out. It came with the box, genuine everything. I thought it was a great deal. It was still over $500 though after all the tax and shipping added.

Then I went to the gym to exercise for a while. I did some squats, some stiff dead lifts, and this exercise I forgot the name of. Keep in mind I only have dumbbells to work with, so with doing the squats, I just held two 25 pound barbells on each hand, lifted them above my shoulder a bit, and then squatted. I did 23 reps, or maybe it was 22 reps. I did two sets of these. It was so tiring because it's a lot of squats. It's more of an endurance exercise than a weight lifting one, or a mix of them anyway.

For the stiff dead lifts, there was this machine there which I used. The problem was that it didn't reach the floor, and the metal thing has this rope hook tied to it, so there is some slack when lifting it up. Basically it wasn't much of a dead lift, because I would lift it up maybe a foot or less at the most. Probably less than a foot. It barely moved from where it was. So yeah. I just had these materials to work with. I made do with them.

Then I came back home, ate that meal I described above, and then completed the rest of my brain training. Sometimes I get annoyed at the brain training. Doing around or more than 200 math problems a day, a bunch of puzzles, word problems. It gets tiring. Like I just want to skip it. However, I'm currently at day 103 streak for my brain workouts, so I will keep it up. A coincidence is that on my birthday, I reached 100 day streaks for them. It was such a weird coincidence. I didn't plan it at all. I just happened to start my brain training right when it was 100 days away from my birthday. So weird right?

I also did some vegan activism posts. I saw this one post on X comparing this "plant based cookie" macros to a cow flesh burger. It had around 2 million views and 40k likes. The comments were all predictably idiotic, singing praises for the dead animal burger when it was compared with a cookie. Are meat eaters alright? They're literally comparing a cookie to a burger and the comments are all "so true I am going to continue to eat meat because of this post" as if anything anyone posted would have changed their minds anyway.

A plant based cookie is just a cookie without animal products, it's a cookie without milk and eggs. That's really it. Vegan foods are just foods without animal products, so no cut up animal parts, no animal secretions, and that's it. It's the only kinds of foods I eat every single day and they are delicious and the best. I think we should stop torturing and killing animals and using their body parts and secretions in food, because we don't have to at all, it's a great idea.

Meat eaters are kind of blown away at the idea it seems, like a cookie made without eggs and milk? Or a cake made that way? For the cake last year, my mom just substituted every time the recipe called for 1 egg, with half a banana, and used some plant based milk instead of cow milk. That was it. The cake came out fine and delicious. Yeah, there's no need to kill an animal to eat. It's not rocket science. The concept seems to be lost on most of society still though.

Anyway, today has been great. I spent a lot, but it was a good day. It was a busy day. I got everything I wanted to done. My teeth are better than ever now. So yeah, I think it was a good day. It was a day well spent.

Oh, I was listening to some quick descriptions of people's lives in the past again, not biographies but more like quick/summarized 3 minute biographies if anything, and people's lives are described in a past tense way, as they should be. However, whatever life they were living at the time, was the present for them. It's the same as today. It's the present right now. For me. As I type this. But it's basically already the future for anyone reading this.

If I ever become somebody, these journals will be read in a past tense sort of way, "he basically just lived a normal life, he went to this dentist this one day, and had a birthday party this other day," something like that. They're reading and talking about it in past tense, while I lived through it in the present tense. Depending on how far this is being read into the future, say 100 years, the crazier and more distant this present day for me, seems to be to them.

It's like me reading about people in 1924, today. They are super far away. They haven't even experience WW2, haven't experienced colored television, haven't experienced sound in movies, haven't experienced cell phones or any other modern marvels. Most people back then probably never flew on a plane once. What about between now and 2124? How many insane events and new inventions will happen and be created? I wouldn't know. 2124 is really far away from me.

Anyway, that was my day today.