Teeth

All my life I’ve prided myself on taking care of my teeth. I couldn’t do anything to save my wisdom teeth, they were coming in sideways, and had to be pulled when I was 16. But since then I have worked sooooo hard to keep them in good condition.

Since becoming an adult I have seldom had a cavity. I floss, I brush, I use little “glide” brushes between my teeth at the gumline. I use mouthwash.

Then I had to have a tooth pulled a few months ago because, for some reason, I had developed an abscess under it! I didn’t understand! Apparently there was a fracture of it, and bacteria got down in below the root and set uphousekeeping. Yuck!

Fortunately, the dental surgeon was fabulous – absolutely fabulous! I felt almost nothing during the procedure.

Yesterday, as I was eating lunch (ham and cheese sandwich on my dear Ol’ Curmudgeon’s excellent homemade rye bread) I felt/heard a “snap / ping!” and pain seared through my jaw! The back tooth in the lower left jaw (the one next to the one previously removed) had split vertically down into the root! YIKES!

I called the dental surgeon, his wonderful office staff worked me in, and the Ol’ Curmudgeon came home from work in time to drive me to and from. This time it was a little less easy, but it wasn’t bad at all. Turns out there was an abscess again! I’m on antibiotics and pain pills (and anti-nausea pills). I “drank” my supper last night (chicken broth) and carefully had the noodles from it today. Also had one of my favorite “sick day” comfort foods – Milk Toast!

Milk Toast a la Gam

2 pieces of white bread (yeah, you can use wheat, but it isn’t as good)
1 1/2 c milk (not skim milk – whole milk)
2 Tbs butter + more to taste
Kosher salt to taste

Preheat oven to 250F. Best if it is a convection oven.

Put the bread in on a rack – not on a pan. set timer for 5-6 minutes

Put milk in a small sauce pan. Put butter in milk.

Slowly heat milk – stirring slowly and frequently – until it boils.

Turn the bread over and toast for another 5-6 minutes or so.

When the milk boils, turn off the heat immediately, sprinkle with Kosher salt, stir, and put a lid on it.

When the bread is nice and dried out, put it in a flat soup bowl (or whatever). Pour the milk over, and add more butter to taste. Let it cool some, and eat.

If you are really needing to put some higher protein nutrition into someone who is sick, beat up an egg into the milk before you heat it up, and heat it very, very gently, stirring constantly. It will thicken somewhat, and will thicken even more as it cools down. Like a pudding.

So here I sit, taking codeine for pain, and trying to drink enough water and other fluids and keep from tossing my cookies. But the pain is less, and will be even less tomorrow. And I’m sure all the sleep is doing me good.

SIGH! I wanted to go to my grave with all the teeth God gave me. Well, 6 down, 26 to go. I hope not.