A moment of silence for my dearly departed second molar.

Had myself a root canal today. It’s not an experience I care to repeat, but all things considered, it wasn’t too big a deal. I wonder why the procedure gets such a bum rap?

I had been ignoring the offending tooth for awhile. It happily played along for a year or so, but the night before I left for California, it finally gave up the ghost. Thankfully, that brief, initial toothache was the worst it had to offer - the pain was dull and intermittent thereafter - but, not wanting to push my luck, I decided to go ahead and get it over with.

So, no big deal. It took a little bit of extra lidocaine to numb things up nice and good, but after that, it was just sit back, relax, and let the dentist go to town. I should point out that my dentist is an all-around great guy (all the more reason to get it over with, given the impending move to Colorado and all), and took pity on my not having insurance by knocking a few hundred bucks off the final bill.

I’m still waiting for the anesthetic to wear off, so whether there’ll any post-op pain, I can’t say. I’ll have the crown placed on Friday.