The Wily Filipino

Gaaaaahhhhh!

After the rollercoaster ride of the last two weeks (though it's been good), more minor miseries here at the batcave, in degree of annoyance:

1. iTunes 5.0 won't recognize my iPod. (I can hear the chorus already: that's because you should have bought a Mac!) No amount of uninstalling and reinstalling could make this piece of buggy and bloated, if beautiful-looking software mount the iPod, even though the computer (and Ephpod, which I'm now using) does.

2. My two-month old Toshiba Satellite is dead. The profile corruption of the week before -- the recovery CD bought me some time -- was a portent of bad things to come, and hopefully no more. "Hard disks do fail," said the repair guy. Gee, thanks. I suspect he wouldn't have been so relatively blithe if the laptop wasn't under warranty anymore.

3. This needs a little context: I have never had a tooth cavity ever. I do not know what novocaine feels like; no needles have ever come near my mouth; no root canals, no tooth extractions, nothing. (The closest I've ever come to dental trauma was having my braces cemented on the week before my high school prom.)

So after years of ignoring my dentist -- "Yes, I know, I should have it removed some time" -- one of my wisdom teeth, which had already been leaving a little dent in the gum below it, decided to erupt with a vengeance yesterday afternoon. (This is the sharp, pointy and evil wisdom tooth in my right cheek; the other one on the left -- the one growing diagonally backwards -- isn't a problem yet.) Now, everytime I bite down -- actually, I can't clamp my teeth together anymore because it hurts -- there's a nice chunk of tender gristle back there that seems to be growing in size every few hours.

I'm hoping the Tylenols and black bean soup (dinner actually hurt) tide me over until my appointment early Monday morning (about 34 hours from now), but I think I'm feeling a little feverish, already talking with a slight lisp, and dreading the night to come. I was going to grade some papers, but I can't concentrate; I'm probably going to bed after popping another Tylenol. (And I'm hoping that I'll be able to lecture for six hours come Tuesday, bleeding gums and painkillers notwithstanding.)

Despite all that, this extremely busy week has been pretty good, the highlights being: 1) Sunday night: dragging J-Lu to see Jun Ichikawa's very fine Tony Takitani (I might post a review later); 2) Friday night: Indonesian rack of lamb at Trader Vic's with Smoothie, Seanny Depp and Big Gay Al; and 3) tomorrow morning: in anticipation of when Izzy and I release our butterflies in Golden Gate Park.

Otherwise: Gaaaaahhhhh!

Posted by the wily filipino at September 10, 2005 10:29 PM