the week: a recap

The last week has been a little more eventful and busy than usual.....in good AND bad ways

Monday was okay.  The day started out normally, and seemed pretty typical and uneventful.  I went to work, and we weren't too terribly busy, but we also had to pack for the remote clinic we were doing this week, so that added a bit of work, and then I had to leave around 3 and haul ass to Lakenheath to get my orders for the remote clinic, and to get my advance done.

I came home and packed my stuff for the next few days, and went to bed a bit earlier than normal.  I woke up around 2 that morning to go to the bathroom, and my face felt really itchy and tight, but I was too tired to be too concerned about it,  but on my way back to bed, I just happened to look at myself in the mirror
and noticed that the left side of my face (and most of my top lip) was very swollen - it was like I was having an allergic reaction to something, but I can't for the life of me figure out what that might have been.  I didn't eat anything strange and I immediately searched myself for bug bites of any kind, and I found nothing. I didn't feel particularly bad, and I didn't really think I was in enough danger to warrant a trip to the emergency room, so I just took a very large amount of benadryl and went to bed.  By the time I woke up 5 1/2 hours later, the swelling of my face and lip had gone down significantly, but the very left corner of my upper lip was still a bit swollen - it looked like collagen filler gone terribly wrong - like I'd let a doctor inject me in one spot and then chickened out and run screaming, like a crazy person,  out of his office with a partially inflated lip.  I couldn't take anymore benadryl at that point because I was about to leave to head to work and then was going to be in a car for 3 1/2 hours on the way to the remote, and I didn't want to be a drowsy mess, so I decided to just tough it out and hope the rest of the swelling would go down on it's own.

I got to work and we loaded up the car and headed out.  We got to Harrogate (which is about a 20 minute drive from the base where we were doing our clinic),  and checked into our hotel (a little bed and breakfast called The Camberley, which I highly recommend - the place is adorable, in a great location and the owners are fabulous), and then one of my coworkers and I went for a ride at Bewerley Riding Centre. It was nice to just ride through the countryside and see all the beautiful farm land and all the fun sheep and cows and whatnot (we even saw some alpacas!), but the saddles they used at this place were "floating" saddles, so it required a lot more work to just stay balanced and steady on top of the horse, so as enjoyable as the ride was, it also resulted in my legs being ridiculously sore the minute I got off of the horse (a very lovely guy named Murphy, for the record).  After that we headed back to The Camberley, got showered and changed and headed out to dinner.  When we sat down to eat we almost all seemed ready to go catch a movie afterwards, but by the time dinner was over, We were all so exhausted that we just decided to call it a night.  I climbed in my bed, took some benadryl (at this point, the swelling was almost totally gone!), and sacked out pretty early.

The next day was the first day of clinic. we got there, set up, and everything went okay.  We were extremely busy, so there were moments that stuff got a little hectic and backed up, but we had enough hands to keep everything from getting crazy. after clinic, we changed our clothes and headed out to do a little sightseeing.  we checked out some ruins of an old castle, and I got a lesson from the others on geocaching, which I'm still on the fence about (can't decide if I think it's interesting or completely ridiculous...) it didn't help that it started pouring down rain while we were geocaching, which made my shoes soggy and my mood grumpy......

for dinner that night we ended up at Betty's, which is a seriously incredible cafe/tea room in Harrogate. I've grown to really love tea rooms since I've been living here, and all the delicious food associated with afternoon tea, and some of the girls from work frequent a tea room in nearby Mildenhall called  Emily's, that I've now become obsessed with, so pretty much any time anyone wants to go to a tea room, I'm up for it, so I was glad that we chose Betty's. Apparently it's pretty famous (there are other Betty's across the UK as well), and there is usually a queue just to get in, but we lucked out (probably because of the torrential downpour that was happening) and walked right in and got a table immediately.  All three of us ordered the Betty's Pink Champagne Afternoon Tea which looks like this:

it included a variety of sandwiches, a sultana scone (my favorite!) with clotted cream and preserves, a selection of mini cakes, house blend tea and, of course, a glass of pink champagne.  every bit of it was delicious, and after trudging through the rain, the tea (and champagne!) was much needed! it's definitely one of my favorite meals so far in the UK, and I can't wait until I have an excuse to go back!

After dinner we all turned in early again.  The next day we got up, headed back out to clinic and zipped through our appointments. We were on the road headed home by noon, and we made it back to Feltwell around 3:00-ish.  I was exhausted and glad to be home, and after I got home and got settled, I just stayed camped out on the couch until I couldn't really hold my eyes open anymore, and then I headed to bed.

Today I had a dentist appointment, and while I have a pretty serious fear of going to the dentist (even for the simplest things), I actually really like my dentist here - he's very funny and has great taste in music, and whenever I go in, we always end up talking about bands or shows we've been to or want to go to, so he really puts me at ease - and the last time I was there, the pain afterward was very minimal, and I was having a similar thing done today, so I figured it would be just like last time.  The first thing they did when I got there was take some impressions for a bite guard I need to wear when I sleep (apparently I've started grinding my teeth at night), and this made me very anxious because in the past, having impressions done were some of the most uncomfortable and anxious moments for me at the dentist - I can handle the sound of the drill and the clinking and clanking of stuff inside my mouth, but something about someone shoving giant trays of overflowing goo into my mouth and forcing me to breath through my nose while trying to control my gag reflex is just really anxiety inducing for me....apparently every other dentist I've ever had has been doing impression incorrectly this whole time because today (once I finally calmed down enough to let them put the trays in my mouth) they weren't all that uncomfortable or even gag worthy...apparently he has a "method" to make it more bearable....once we finally got THAT over with and I spent a good 10 minutes wiping excess mold stuff off of my face, he got down to business, and about 45 minutes later, I was headed out the door.  My right cheek and the right side of my chin were completely numb, as was the right side of my tongue, but I had a few errands I needed to run, and despite feeling self conscious about the fact that I could barely speak and that I had the potential to unknowingly have drool dripping down my face at any time,  I bit the bullet and went about my business.  I only got a few weird looks (one from the girl at the bank when I accidentally "slurped" when I was trying to talk to her - after which I said "SHORRY. I'VE JUSHT COME FROM THE DENTISHTH"), and kept my attempts at talking to a minimum.  I came home and had a numb face for a few more hours.  I kept wishing that the feeling would come back into my face so that I could eat and drink something (and actually taste it normally), but once it did, I prayed for the numbness to return. It hurts like HELL right now on the right side of my mouth.  I don't know why I'm having so much more pain this time - I'm not sure if it's because of the location, or maybe this is just my week to be a sissy? I don't know...all I can tell you is that it feels like there are a dozen teeny tiny angry villagers stabbing the inside of my mouth with teeny, tiny little spears. I've taken some Ibuprofen, and I'm hoping it will kick in soon, or at least that I can go to sleep and stay that way until the pain isn't so bad.

I've also started keeping an actual paper journal again, not so much for myself as it is for my hypothetical grandchildren who may need some helpful info to do some school project one day....but seriously, I have always enjoyed reading the letters my grandparents and great grandparents wrote when they were younger, and I figure I owe it to anyone who might care someday to leave behind something a little more tangible than an online blog....from the couple of entries I've written in it, I've realized why I've put off doing it for so long: because writing things by hand HURTS.  I definitely prefer typing to writing, but I'm going to keep at it....carpal tunnel be damned!

The weekend should be pretty uneventful (or at least I hope it is...I need a couple of days to just do absolutely nothing). I plan to do a lot of sleeping and hanging with the dogs. and hopefully NOT a lot of bitching and moaning about how much my teeth hurt....