The Dynamic Duo

I’ll bet you can hardly believe your good fortune. You actually get to read about a current event in the life of UltraMom…the very day it actually happened! And so, without further ado, I bring you “A Not-Half-Bad Day”

UltraMom gazed out at the snowy landscape and mentally reviewed the season. This was Spring, wasn’t it? The daffodils drooped their sad little heads under the weight of their caps of snow and UltraMom drooped her sad little head at the unsettling thought that spring had come and gone. I mean, just a couple of days ago, it had been warm enough for tank tops and shorts. She put in an exercise video and waited for the promised move-your-body feel-good endorphins to kick in, but on this particular morning even they seemed to be a little sluggish. UltraMom glanced at the clock and was startled to realize that, not only did she not have time for breakfast, but if she took any longer than a 10-minute bath, she would be late for her dental appointment in Elko. Twenty minutes later, UltraMom headed out the door, not SO very late.
The dentist appointment was for the purpose of making sure UltraMom’s new Night Guard fit properly. Several days earlier, when Umom was telling Sis-in-Law Pat about her new mouth appliance, she suddenly realized that “Night Guard” sounded more like a man who patrolled one’s premises after dusk looking out for burglars. The image so amused her that she told Pat about it, even describing said hunky ‘Night Guard’ who would go by the name of ‘Thor.’ Perhaps ‘Thor’ would be the mouthpiece’s pet name, she mused.
The purpose of the Night Guard was to stop UltraMom from grinding her teeth together while she slept. It seemed to be making her TMJ worse, not to mention wearing grooves in her molars. About two weeks ago, plaster casts had been made of her upper and lower teeth, which was a lot of fun, and left disgusting bits of plaster in her mouth and it took several hours to find and spit them all out. Now, seated in the dentist chair, the 20-something year old technician rammed the clear plastic piece over UltraMom’s upper teeth. Wow! It really hurt! “It takes a little getting used to,” she said cheerily. “Now, lets see you take it out. Just start at the back and hook your fingernails over it.” UltraMom tried. And tried, and tried again. There was NO WAY that thing was coming out. The tech tried, and only managed to gouge UtraMom’s gums with her fingernails. Finally she got a metal dental tool and managed to pry it off. “I guess we need to send it back for adjustment,” she admitted. “We’ll call you when we get it back.”
This was fine with UltraMom. She headed to the car, snagging a doughnut from the tray near the receptionist’s desk on her way out. It seemed funny to her that doughnuts and muffins would be sitting around at a dentist’s office, and usually she didn’t take one, but today, after all the pain and suffering and the skipping of breakfast, she felt the need for a little reward.
Okay, switching out of tiresome third person narration, I had just walked out the door, and taken my first bite, when I heard the perky little tech’s voice behind me, “Sweetie, you need to come back in. The dentist wants to look at how it fits.” Now, right on par with being called “Ma’am” (I know, I know, it is respectful and all, but makes me feel 52 years old. Yes, I also know that is how old I am, but that is NOT how old I want to feel.) is being called ‘Sweetie” by someone 30 years younger than I am. So, I was a little cranky when I took my place back in the chair. I was determined to finish my treat, and was hurriedly brushing yeasty, glazed crumbs off my “bib” when the dentist entered carrying my mouthpiece.
“I took it down a little,” he offered. “Let’s see how it fits now.” Wow! THAT hurt even worse than before! And again, no way I could get it out. The dentist gouged my gums even worse than the tech had, and finally resorted to a dental tool and chisel. As he pounded on the edge, jarring my whole head, he made a little joke. “Don’t worry,” he laughed, “you won’t have to use this every day!” Finally it was out again. “That is really tight, isn’t it? I guess I need to take it down some more.” That prompted me to ask what he meant by “take it down.” I mean, was he wrestling the thing, beating it into submission? No, it seems ‘take it down’ referred to removing part of the night guard material to loosen its grip. He was back in 5 minutes or so, and now the thing was only half as deep as when we started. “Lets see if this is any better,” he said. “I sure hope so,” I replied fearfully. “Well, if I need to, I will just take it down some more,” he assured me a bit testily. He didn’t need to take it down any more. In fact, as I write this post, “Thor” is in my mouth, covering my top teeth. When my bottom teeth try to find their northern counterparts and grind, they are stopped by the smooth plastic sheath. The only problem I can see now is that my tongue may become raw feeling the jagged edge where the guard has been ‘taken down.’ And now that I think of it, why did they even need to take the mold for my bottom teeth?
So, finally away from that torture chamber, I ran a few errands. Took back my library materials and checked out some more. Went to J.C. Penney’s to return Heather’s birthday shirts and find her some more. To the $1.05 Store to spend $30 on stuff I didn’t need.
And then home, where I found Murphy and Rowdy racing about the house in high energy and UltraDad, who was trying to get over a bad cold, asleep on the couch.
UltraDad and I had plans for this day. We were going to the movie theater to see “300”, a show about 300 Spartans, back in the day, who did a bunch of fighting against their enemy. I had heard just a bit about it from several of my kids. Johnny liked it, but assured me that I wouldn’t. Ditto for Heather. “Too much violence and nudity,” she explained. UltraDad had planned to go see it solo, but after this I asked him to wait for me. I was getting a bit tired, I decided, of my children censoring my movies for me.
While UltraDad woke up and got ready, I took the ‘boys’ for a quick walk around town to take the edge off their surplus energy. It was COLD out there, but I seemed to feel it more than they did, despite their recent short haircuts.
We decided to have lunch in town, and tried a place we hadn’t eaten before; a little café adjoined to a service station. I really liked it; they had a very nice, very reasonably priced, soup and salad bar. Nestled incongruously, but deliciously, among the salad ingredients was a bowl of raisiny bread pudding, of which I had a generous portion. After lunch, we had a little time to kill, so went to Walmart to buy a new telephone for the house. The old one had developed an annoying little habit. When someone called, the phone would ring, but when you tried to answer it, it would emit loud beeps and the words “searching” would appear on the phone. Actually talk to the person on the other end of the line? Forget it. We had decided, at last, to replace it, and finally settled on one of the higher end models, hoping this would mean less problems in the long run.
And now it was time for the movie. We indulged in some movie popcorn and settled back to enjoy the show. Now I hate to admit this, but my kids were kind of right. I didn’t care all that much for the movie, at least the parts I saw. I closed my eyes a bit in the first major fighting scene, and didn’t open them again until some time later, after having a great little nap. And I guess I missed all the nudity, darn it. What I did see was Leonidas rallying his men, and a lot of shouting about the honor of dying for Sparta, which they all did. After all, as we all know, if we have watched the movie for even 5 minutes, Spartans do NOT know how to surrender. Actually, that is a skill that may have saved their lives, but probably at the cost of enslaving their entire country, so perhaps its just as well that they didn’t. Enhancing our movie experience were four or five young men seated a couple of rows behind us who kept up a loud commentary throughout the show, enthusiastically encouraging the Spartans to keep on fighting. They got especially excited when someone got an arm lopped off, a spear in the chest, or was thrown over a cliff. But UltraDad liked it, (the movie, not the running commentary) so I was glad we went.
We were excited to get home and show the ‘boys’ the new toys we had found for them. One is a soft plastic “flying saucer” that lights up when you throw it. They seem kind of scared of that one, actually. Another is a cute little squeaky beaver, with a really good tail for grabbing and shaking. But my favorite is a dog hand puppet. When you squeeze his jaws together, he barks out a song, one note per squeeze. That one is fun for all, especially me!
And so, that was my day. Hope yours was good too. Tomorrow, back to the usual, and I hope, back to sunshine.

UltraMom