this story starts in 1998... ...but let's start on friday. On Friday morning as I was enjoying a delicious Cinnamon Crunch Bagel from Panera Bread for breakfast, when i found that my bagel had a little extra crunch... a crown had come out of my mouth. so i called up the dentist and set up an appointment for today (well, i was kind of hoping to get in there last week, but, they were booked so i had to wait until today... no big deal. well, when I went in to have them cement the tooth back into my mouth, they found that the underlying tooth had split in half. and the reason why i wasn't feeling pain over the weekend was because i had had a root canal on that tooth back in 2001. back when i was in college there was a 3 year period where i didn't have dental insurance. so i just didn't go to the dentist for 3 years... when i made my glorious return, it turned out that i needed to get 2 root canals.. damn. well, you know how everyone remembers where they were on Sept 11? Well, I was getting a root canal when i heard the news on the radio. so i've had the root canal in this tooth for 8 years, and when the crown became loose, well, it split the bottom of the tooth in half. and because of that.. the tooth had to go. if you are unaware what happens in situations like this, you have a couple of options... (a) no tooth there... so that's kind of a non option... (b) a bridge.. cheaper, but you are essentially bringing 2 other teeth into the mix, or (c) an implant... an implant consist of the dentist numbing you up, slicing a piece of you gums for access to your jaw, and then drilling a metal post into your jaw, upon which a crown will sit. actually, by drill, it is more of a ratcheting wrench they use in there. Well, luckily for me, i got to have this little procedure done for me today! A lady that was supposed to come in today for a similar procedure had to cancel. (usually you would have to schedule this procedure as they don't have the posts on-hand as i suppose they are a bit expensive). so that big white area in the X-Ray (that they so kindly provided to me when i asked and told them it was for a goofy photography project) is a piece of metal which is now drilled into my jaw. the pain meds are helping a bit... but i wish they were a bit stronger ;-( oh, and now i don't have a tooth there (i'm holding the x-ray over where the incident happened) for the next 6 months! shmobist info: see that little black thing under my pinky? that's a little flashlight. it's lighting the x-ray. and i'm being lit by a sunlight.

PV2 Norwich and PFC Fergurson inspect the mysterious device that appeared on their table overnight. After much deliberation it was concluded that the device was a TriFibulating Diyopsys, a unique dimentional transvergence device composed of a 3/8 in ratcheting wrench, tweezers, a magazine clip, UK power adapter, Zune charger, drawer guide, and a tempurature sensor.