I think that few would disagree that the perfect ending to the day is going to a late afternoon dentist appointment in which a cavity will be filled and a wisdom tooth, which happens to be right next to the tooth with the cavity so why not take care if it with the same freezing, pulled.  I also think that it is pretty obvious that just as once a few decades ago I whited out the definition of "idiot" in my dictionary in order to replace it with my little brother's name, I have no re-defined "perfect" to mean "extremely crappy." 

Thankfully I freeze easily, and the wisdom tooth came out quite easily, so not a big deal. 

And it lead to to the fun discovery that cold root bear tastes hot and salty during the period in which the freezing has almost, but not quite completely, worn off the tongue.  What made the experience especially strange was that only half my tongue had been frozen, so on the unaffected half it tasted normally cold and sweet while at the same time on the other half, as I mentioned, it was hot and salty. 

And so went my evening, in the form of a recursive function,

int root_bear_experience(int sips_left)
{
   
   sips_left = sips_left - 1;

   thought_1 = "strange";

   thought_2 = "and also, kind of yuck";

   thought_3 = "this is just really wrong.  Not drinking any more until it tastes right.";

  time_passes = 1;

   thought_4 = "was it really as strange as I remember?;

  if(sips_left > 0)
        root_bear_experience(sips_left);
  else
     return 0;
}


And I wish I could blame this entry on the pain meds making me loopy, except I haven't actually taken any since, like I said, it really wasn't that bad and where I had the wisdom tooth doesn't hurt at all.

On the other hand, my fun salty hot root bear sensation has now been replaced by "ow ow ow" searing pain through the tooth that had the filling put in whenever I take a sip of my soda.   It's a little concerning as I don't think this is supposed to happen, is it?  It's been well over a decade since I last had a filling put in, so I my memory isn't clear, but I don't recall anything of this sort before.  Perhaps it is just because the filling is so new and it will clear up on it's own by tomorrow?  Is my dentist even open tomorrow if it hasn't?  Is it a really bad idea to get stuff like dental work done late in the day immediately preceding a four day weekend?  I can, at least, answer the last question: why yes, it probably is. 

At least this only happens when I take a drink of root bear so far, not that I have tried to eat or drink anything else since the numbness went away.  Hey, that's right - I haven't had anything else.  Maybe it is just the soda, and my dentist did it on purpose in order to make me quit the sticky sweet cause of the cavity that needed filling. 

Because, you know, while the hot-salty thing just made me say I wasn't going to drink any more in the same way I used to say I wasn't going to touch my tongue to 9-volt batteries any more, but yet I always would again because I just couldn't believe that it could feel or taste that strange without experiencing it again, the searing pain thing really did make me stop. 

So, um, oh wise Dr. Eljay, in yoru vast experience, is this normal?