Aaarrrrrggghhh - the dreaded day has arrived - the day of my big dentist appointment. Yikes and double yikes! And you'll know exactly what I mean if you too suffer from "dentophobia". Aaarrrggghhh (again) !!!!!
look at this patient's face - if you ever witness a scene such as this,
these are the tell-tale signs of what is a typical case of dentophobia,
only at "mild" level of phobia obviously!
this mid-appointment exit would be classed as a "moderate" level of dentophobia
10:30 Lois and I drive to Cheltenham, park the car and walk to our dental surgery, arriving about 10 minutes ahead of my 11:40 am appointment. I don't know what to expect, but I am fearing it's going to be a long, gruelling session, and although it turns out not to be, it still leaves me feeling like a limp rag at the end of it all anyway, because of all that build-up of tension beforehand.
My dentist, Kesh, takes out 2 of my bottom front teeth. He gives me an injection first, but the teeth more or less drop out anyway of their own accord, they're so loose. My goodness! Still, better quick than slow, that's what I always say about dental jobs. In return Kesh fits a little partial denture with 2 teeth to replace the lost ones.
gloved hands of a typical dentist fitting a partial denture
Now I've got a mouth that "just doesn't feel right" - has Kesh done the fitting correctly? Well, we'll see!
I do the driving of the 25 miles to Cheltenham for my dental appointment, but Lois has gamely offered to drive us home afterwards, predicting that I would be feeling a bit rubbish. This is quite brave of her, because she more or less gave up driving during the lockdowns at the start of the pandemic, and she's only driven very occasionally in the last few weeks.
Although driving makes Lois feel tense because of lack of practice, she passes the test today with flying colours - she drives really confidently, more confidently than me, I would say. She has a different style from me - tending to drive quite close behind the car in front.
The only slightly alarming aspect for me of her style is that she also likes to drive quite close to the kerb - and if I'm in the front passenger seat, as today, with the window open, it sometimes feels like we're driving through the roadside hedges, and I'm always half-expecting to get a mouthful of privet at any moment - is it edible? I don't know, but I'd like to be told!
But I'm going to let that one slide - we've all got our own styles of driving, haven't we haha!!!!
On the way back we post some letters at Hanley Swan, in a Royal Mail postbox that some local resident has decorated for the Coronation, with all the royal symbols: crown, orb and sceptre.
Hanley Swan Royal Mail postbox -
decorated with all the royal symbols: crown, orb and sceptre
Awwwww, how cute !!!!!
In the meantime Lois has lined up a selection of tempting "baby foods" for me to have, particularly over the next 24 hours: lunch is soup with bread and butter that can be dipped in the soup if necessary. With our 4pm cup of Earl Grey tea, she does me some bread and butter with Nutella on - yum yum! And tonight it'll be cottage pie, peas and spinach, or something similar.
16:30 All day we've been wondering how our daughter Sarah and her family are getting on in Dubai on their way back from Perth, Australia, to England, moving back after 7 years.
I got a text early this morning from Sarah to say that they'd landed safely in Dubai, and now as Lois and I sip our Earl Grey, I look at my smartphone and see that Sarah has just posted two spectacular pictures. They're obviously renting an apartment high up on some skyscraper there. There's a 3 hour time difference between us and Dubai, so it's about 7:30 pm there, and already as dark as anything - what a crazy planet we live on !!!!!
our 9-year-old twin granddaughters, Jessica (left) and Lily
Wow - what an experience for the twins - my goodness !!!!
I didn't travel anywhere beyond England and Wales until I was 19, and then it was only to the Netherlands, which isn't that different from England in the grand scheme of things, is it.
flashback to 1965 - me at the bus station at Kijkduin, Holland
on my first ever trip to the Continent
20:00 We settle down on the couch to watch this week's edition of University Challenge, the student quiz. It's another quarter-final, this time between Durham University and University College, London.
Lois and I are feeling pretty rough - just saying! However, we still manage to answer 5 questions that the students get wrong, so that makes us feel a bit better - call us hopeless obsessives if you like haha!
See if you know any of these "doozies". Bet you don't haha!
1. Name this historical boardgame: during the war phase, the players are us versus them, during the political phase it's me versus you, Athenian faction versus Athenian faction, and Spartan king versus Spartan king. The game shares its name with an Athenian leader.
Students: [pass]
Colin and Lois: Pericles
2. Give the title and author of this book from the Bronte family: characters include Nelly Dean, Hareton Earnshaw and Isabella Linton.
Students: Villette by Jane Eyre [Say whaaaaaat????? - Ed]
Colin and Lois: Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte.
3. In 2019 Fiona Kolbinger of Germany became the first woman to win the Transcontinental Cycle Race across Europe. The course ran from the Black Sea to which naval base southwest of Roskoff in Brittany?
Students: Vannes
Colin and Lois: Brest
4. Jacinda Ardern, until recently Prime Minister of New Zealand : in 2020 Ardern won a landslide victory. What centre-right party was her main opposition?
Students: Conservatives
Colin and Lois: National Party
5. Name the directive to a musician to perform with great rapidity.
Students: velo
Colin and Lois: veloce
Not much is it. But it's a good spread of subjects, isn't it, and of course we answer tons of questions right that the students also get! [Really? "Tons"??? I seriously doubt that! - Ed]
Well, Lois and I have to grab all the self-confirmation we can get these days, that's for sure!!!
21:00 We wind down with the first half of an interesting documentary about singer Little Richard.
Fascinating programme if a bit long at 90 minutes. After the first 45 minutes, the story gets to the guy's mysterious conversion to religion during an aeroplane flight - Lois is already fast asleep by this point, so I switch off the programme and wake her up so we can go up to bed. What madness !!!!
We had neither of us ever really thought about the guy's sexuality, despite his obvious flamboyance.
My goodness !!!!!
Lois and I wouldn't even have heard him singing on BBC Radio in any case, when we were young teenagers - the Musicians Union effectively stopped the BBC from playing too many records on air - what a crazy world we lived in, in those far-off days!
Both my sister Kathy and I, and Lois, used to listen sometimes, as teenagers, to Radio Luxembourg in the evenings, which was a commercial station beyond the reach of the Musicians Union and which did play lots of records. And Lois and I still vividly remember the frequency you had to turn the tuning dial to - 208metres Medium Wave - remember that? [Nobody's going to remember that these days, are they. Be realistic! - Ed]
typical teenagers listening to Radio Luxembourg in the 1950's - 1960's
But it was the Alan Freed Show from the USA that Radio Luxembourg did re-broadcast, and that was where UK artists like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones first heard Little Richard's music.
And it's an intriguing story to hear how white artists like Pat Boone brought out tamer versions of Little Richard's songs, such as Tutti Frutti and Long Tall Sally.
This led white teenagers to appreciate songs like Tutti Frutti, but then led them subsequently to find better versions from the original singers. And this in turn led to alarm amongst white segregationists and preachers in the South, to add to the existing alarm expressed by black preachers, who were disturbed by the sexuality of the lyrics and the rhythms etc.
Oh dear!
But fascinating stuff !!!!
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzz!!!!!
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