Well, the wisdom tooth extraction did not go as smoothly as the one 3 weeks ago. My appointment was shifted to 4 pm and I wasn't actually in the chair until 5 and then it took my dentist an hour of prying and tugging to get the tooth out. Obviously my teeth like being in my mouth! So, not only is the extraction area sore, but so are my right cheek and the corner of my mouth he was pressing on. But I haven't bruised, which really surprises me. So, I'm living on Tylenol 3s and smooth soup (to make sure nothing gets in the cavity) until tonight. Tomorrow I can start chewing soft stuff, carefully. Not surprisingly, I have a headache and it's a good thing I get to stay home today, as I would not be good company at all. The cats don't care if I whine and complain as long as I feed them!

The Chambered Nautilus

This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign,
Sails the unshadowed main, --
The venturous bark that flings
On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings
In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings,
And coral reefs lie bare,
Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair.

Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl!
Wrecked is the ship of pearl!
And every chambered cell,
Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell,
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell,
Before thee lies revealed, --
Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed!

Year after year beheld the silent toil
That spread his lustrous coil;
Still, as the spiral grew,
He left the past year's dwelling for the new,
Stole with soft step its shining archway through,
Built up its idle door,
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.

Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,
Child of the wandering sea,
Cast from her lap, forlorn!
From thy dead lips, a clearer note is born
Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn!
While on mine ear it rings,
Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings: --

Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
As the swift seasons roll!
Leave thy low-vaulted past!
Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,
Till thou at length art free,
Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!

Oliver Wendell Holmes
1809 - 1894