It's been a week.
Mar. 25th, 2008 11:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
viverraI think I need to check my horoscope or something. Last week was Not To Be Repeated™.
My computer crashed. Entirely my fault; I pulled out the ethernet plug and accidently snagged the power plug at the same time. Macs are usually pretty robust about things like that, but this time the hard drive got trashed. Like the computer didn't even know it had a hard drive.
Luckily I have a bootable backup drive. Unfortunately, the last time I had backed up was at the end of January. Fortunately my work is mostly low tech and this was not a crisis. Unfortunately my customer records were computerized and I didn't know who had paid and who hadn't, and I haven't yet done my taxes.. You can see the see-saw.
Then. I delivered a repair to a customer, a lovely lady, a retired doctor. She gave me a lollipop as I was leaving. I bit into it and broke a tooth. #12, if anyone is interested; that's the one just behind the upper left canine. I didn't just break a little piece. I essentially split the tooth, breaking it off below the gumline and exposing the nerve.
My dentist just retired, and I didn't really know his replacement. Now I do, and I must say I'm rather pleased with him. First, he squeezed me in, but he also went far above the call of duty and took a lot of time discussing the situation with me and talking over the options. Ultimately, I had to go to an oral surgeon for the extraction. He was much more brusque. (I know this hurts but I've got to do it). The tooth came out.
Much of the rest of the week passed in a Vicoden fog. They don't suture the gum; you can actually see the bone and you want a blood clot to form on it so it can heal and you can't disturb the clot or you risk what's called "dry socket". Ycch. It's a great way to diet; you don't want to eat anything and you take tiny sips of liquid. They recommended ice cream, so I indulged there. I'm a bit lactose intolerant, so it gives me the runs, but Vicoden gives you constipation and it seems to have all balanced out. (I'm sure everyone wants to hear these details).
My biggest problem has been keeping my tongue away from the socket. And the awful unbrushed feeling the nearby teeth have. And feeling like a poster crone if I smile widely. The gum needs to heal for 6-8 weeks before they can do anything else, so I have time to consider whether to get an implant or a bridge. Both are about equally pricey (a bridge requires capping the adjacent teeth).
Meanwhile, data recovery... Thinking the drive was trashed, I bought a program called "Data Rescue II", because the demo could see the files on the disk. But when I ran it, most of the files were trash. I got what I could, and then used Disk Utility to re-partition the drive (NOT re-initialize it). This seemed to heal the drive; the computer could now see it. But it said the drive was blank. BUT -- Data Rescue also has a "restore deleted files" function. I ran that, and found thousands of files. Yay! But unfortunately, none had a name, just numbers. They were arranged by file type. And there were many many duplicates. Apparently, autosave saves a copy, which doesn't make it into the directory but which is a file nonetheless that can be rescued. Many were file fragments. But I got back my most critical files, and think wading through the other salvaged files will have to be a new hobby for awhile... it would be nice to get back the month-and-a-half of emails I lost.
And it will be nice when my mouth stops hurting.
My computer crashed. Entirely my fault; I pulled out the ethernet plug and accidently snagged the power plug at the same time. Macs are usually pretty robust about things like that, but this time the hard drive got trashed. Like the computer didn't even know it had a hard drive.
Luckily I have a bootable backup drive. Unfortunately, the last time I had backed up was at the end of January. Fortunately my work is mostly low tech and this was not a crisis. Unfortunately my customer records were computerized and I didn't know who had paid and who hadn't, and I haven't yet done my taxes.. You can see the see-saw.
Then. I delivered a repair to a customer, a lovely lady, a retired doctor. She gave me a lollipop as I was leaving. I bit into it and broke a tooth. #12, if anyone is interested; that's the one just behind the upper left canine. I didn't just break a little piece. I essentially split the tooth, breaking it off below the gumline and exposing the nerve.
My dentist just retired, and I didn't really know his replacement. Now I do, and I must say I'm rather pleased with him. First, he squeezed me in, but he also went far above the call of duty and took a lot of time discussing the situation with me and talking over the options. Ultimately, I had to go to an oral surgeon for the extraction. He was much more brusque. (I know this hurts but I've got to do it). The tooth came out.
Much of the rest of the week passed in a Vicoden fog. They don't suture the gum; you can actually see the bone and you want a blood clot to form on it so it can heal and you can't disturb the clot or you risk what's called "dry socket". Ycch. It's a great way to diet; you don't want to eat anything and you take tiny sips of liquid. They recommended ice cream, so I indulged there. I'm a bit lactose intolerant, so it gives me the runs, but Vicoden gives you constipation and it seems to have all balanced out. (I'm sure everyone wants to hear these details).
My biggest problem has been keeping my tongue away from the socket. And the awful unbrushed feeling the nearby teeth have. And feeling like a poster crone if I smile widely. The gum needs to heal for 6-8 weeks before they can do anything else, so I have time to consider whether to get an implant or a bridge. Both are about equally pricey (a bridge requires capping the adjacent teeth).
Meanwhile, data recovery... Thinking the drive was trashed, I bought a program called "Data Rescue II", because the demo could see the files on the disk. But when I ran it, most of the files were trash. I got what I could, and then used Disk Utility to re-partition the drive (NOT re-initialize it). This seemed to heal the drive; the computer could now see it. But it said the drive was blank. BUT -- Data Rescue also has a "restore deleted files" function. I ran that, and found thousands of files. Yay! But unfortunately, none had a name, just numbers. They were arranged by file type. And there were many many duplicates. Apparently, autosave saves a copy, which doesn't make it into the directory but which is a file nonetheless that can be rescued. Many were file fragments. But I got back my most critical files, and think wading through the other salvaged files will have to be a new hobby for awhile... it would be nice to get back the month-and-a-half of emails I lost.
And it will be nice when my mouth stops hurting.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-03-26 01:55 pm (UTC)On another subject, the offer still stands to house any of your people who will be in town for your dad's event. Let me know if I can help with that, or anything else. I'm mostly here so I could do things.
Feel better. If things continue to run amok, stay in bed for a day, paint some lamb's blood over your door, hang a clove of garlic out there too, then take the lamb meat and the rest of the garlic, some salt, pepper, rosemary, put it all together, call some friends, tell them to come over and bring wine, cook the lamb until it's tender enough to chew without hurting your mouth, and have a nice party.
And feel better soon.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-26 06:06 pm (UTC)I'll need someone to bartend. Just beer, wine, and soft drinks. Anything more will have to be later in the evening. Know any prospects? Not to mention advice. I don't drink soda, so I don't know what to get. Or how much. Of anything. I'll be there starting on the 5th, and could use someone to panicbabble to. I have zilch experience as a hostess.
Ooh nice recipe. I've been exploring the variations on mashed sweet potato. That sounds better. Maybe we can do your recipe while I'm down there.