Things that are good.

1) Whisky.

My new dental work has developed complications. Yesterday my poor fiancee had to stand staunchly by and witness as I went from pain to worse pain to constantly bathing my sore teeth with ice water every 20 seconds to avoid entering the 7th circle of Hell, even taking side trips off the interstate to raid the ice machine at Safeway, and then again at McDonald's. How does one sleep while bathing a tooth every 20 seconds, you ask? We scurried to the internet last night to find out. Which leads me to the next good thing:

2) The internet.

Turns out you can put a stop to the eternal 20-second cycle of ice water treatments by bathing the area with mouthwash, or better yet, whisky. Teeth still hurt, but that horrific 7th-level-of-Hell feeling subsides nicely for several hours. Big thank you to the several people who posted this advice on line, for free. I slept just fine last night, and my teeth didn't start to hurt again until after I woke up. In the car on the way to my dentist my complication developed another complication, and I whiled away the usual traffic jam on the way to Boulder by making bargains with God and using mouthwash every 10 minutes or so.*

My dentist reports that the mouthwash/whisky trick works simply because alcohol is a topical anesthetic. Not because it kills germs, and of course it won't cure your tooth problem. As your dental problem worsens alcohol loses its ability to relieve pain for very long, which is why there's:

3) Novocaine.

Sweet, sweet Novocaine.

I'm off to see the endo- and/or periodontist this afternoon, presumably for a root canal.

Wild entertainment beyond belief!

:)

* - I don't believe in "God" but making bargains with an imaginary deity seemed better at the time than praying for death.