Bow Down And Serve The #30 Molar!!!

Today is blog as catharsis. Be warned.

So many viable phrases competed to be the title for today's entry. All of them express my feelings of the moment toward my insurance plan.

You will remember (and if you don't, refer to yesterday's entry) that I took yesterday to serve the cesspool of pain that I know as my mouth. I was able to get in with a kindly chatty old dentist (Do you like teaching in Putnam City? What about those kids with single parents? Is it hard to be single in OKC?) who after a 5 min x ray (it would have been 3 min had I not been a gagger), declared that I was in need of a root canal! And that he does not perform this procedure! And the specialist he recommends is not on my insurance! Now take these prescriptions and be gone with you!!!

This prompts a call to my insurance company to find out who I can employ with the honor of performing my root canal. They are happy to share the name of the one dentist carried on state dental with me. Not only that, but they give me the bonus tip that dental prescriptions are not included on my plan!

Upon calling this kingpin of specialists, I am rewarded with the news that he has over 100 patients and is accepting no new ones. I do not have time to tell his gentle receptionist that I do not wish for an ongoing relationship, just a quickie root canal because she hangs up on me!

I call my dad for support. His role is to calm me, telling me that I do so much for others that the least I deserve is a root canal (yeah, I know) and how unjust the cold world is. He doesn't do that, but does give me potential title #1 for today's entry No Wonder The State Will Pick Up Your Insurance Next Year...It Sucks!. He demands that I call the insurance back and tell them my plight, that in Oklahoma's capitol city, no one will perform a root canal on a teacher!! I suppose he is sure that this will cause them to create an oral surgeon with power tools in their basement laboratory.

It doesn't. In fact, the friendly rep who takes my call says that his wife was thrilled (!!!) with the root canal she got in Stillwater! And that Stillwater is not that bad a drive!!!

Crap Agnes. I go to dad's, cry, call the guy in Stillwater, make an appt, and get dad to agree to drive me. I try to make it sound fun. I plan to burn Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson CDs for the trip and resign myself to this trip. I have come back to edit this after seeing how many times I have used the word trip in this sentence. I have decided to aim higher and use it more. Trip trip trip.

Are you still with me? Because I have more...

I am walking through Target as therapy (shout out if anyone else is comforted by Target) and call Jill for solace (I am high maintenance and want to tell the funny stories). She gives a second potential title You Don't Really Need Teeth To Teach, Do You? It makes me think of the stories my sister told during her tenure as a missionary to prostitutes coming off the street in Cleveland. She tells me many of them don't have teeth and it has, in fact, been a positive career move for them.

That's it. I am a slave to the #30.

A bit of blog-housekeeping.

Thanks to the Parish folk for a swell time on Tuesday. My mind has done cartwheels thinking over the discussions. Good times. We shall do it again.

Kara DeAnn tells me she has shared this blog with an old friend of mine. Who are you, old friend? Are you reading? Comment and show yourself!!