I've been watching clips of Monkey Dust on Youtube every chance I get, lately. It's all so weird and so brilliant and at the same time, so 'veddy British'. It's the best animated take on skit shows I've ever seen.
The Paedofinder General is just one of the regular characters. You can see a lot of the other animated skits and characters on Youtube. They're ALL good. I've never seen one that was a dud. The satire can often reach heights John Stewart can only wish he can reach; though Stephen Colbert can and does reach this level of intentional"so stupid it's brilliant". The whole show is so brilliant that it's exclusionary. That's why you'll never see it on Philippine TV. Not even on cable in the foreseeable future. Because there simply won't be a big enough pool of people who'd understand who would get it.
AND it hasn't been officially released on DVD yet.
Anyway... Thanks Youtube!
Our Keyboard Be the Shiznit
BEHOLD! Our Microsoft Natural Keyboard. We got it back in 1995. We took it out of retirement this week because the keyboard we were using was all busted. It just gave up for some reason and nothing we did could ever get it to work.
The first thing I noticed when I took it out of the box was the weight. It weighs probably thrice as much the other keyboard. My guess is it still uses solid/hard integrated circuits instead of the more usual flexible silicone film circuits today. It also takes up a huge amount of space. It's also made in Mexico, because back in the day, China DIDN'T make everything.
This particular model has the distinction of being the first to feature a "Windows" key and that funny little "menu key". It doesn't have the Power, Hibernate, and Standby keys many keyboards today have. The Num Lock key on the keypad also allows you to use the keypad to move the mouse cursor. It's pretty much a pioneer. I know this isn't the first so called 'ergonomic keyboard', because I know I've seen keyboards that claimed to be ergonomic even back when we were still using DOS, back in the late 80's and early 90's.
It's actually pretty comfy. It does work as advertised at relieving wrist fatigue. The keys are pretty stiff, though. I mean they are STIFF. And the number '6' is on the wrong side for touch typing. Overall, the Microsoft engineers had a great concept but botched execution.
The stiffness and the fact that it took up a lot of space were the reasons we replaced it. First with a Logitech knock-off of this keyboard. That one wasn't as comfy (the angles were all wrong) but the keys were a whole lot smoother.
But it's a good thing we kept it around, though. We must have had 4 or 6 keyboards in 12 years. And whenever those broke down, we reverted to using this very keyboard for a couple of months before finally replacing it.
Personally, I love this keyboard. Precisely because of its quirks and flaws. The first time I ever went online, back in 1995, I used this very keyboard. I made my first long-ish writing compositions on this keyboard. I'm not the fastest typist by any means, probably because you really have to type slow on this one. I've actually used typewriters with smoother action on the keys and I'm not even joking. I feel my unique, unnecessarily hard and loud typing style was necessitated by this keyboard and has become a habit that has been very hard to break.
When I hack out sentences and paragraphs with this keyboard I feel a connection with the era of old-timey manual typing and I have this delusion that it helps me channel all the greats who busted their asses on typewriters (we did too, back in school. But that's another story).
This is without a doubt, the most human piece of hardware we have.
A Word To The Wise
Last week I got a dental check-up. It was my first visit to a dentist in maybe 15 years. I can't really go into the details of why it took so long but I finally had the state of my teeth evaluated.
The first thing I was told was that I needed braces. I guess a dentist of all people would have a vested interest getting people to put on braces, but in my case you don't need to be a dentist to know that I do. Second thing was that I needed to have my wisdom teeth removed because they were severely impacted and as a prerequisite for braces.
Next, I was told that my lower left wisdom tooth would have to be removed even if I didn't want braces anyway because it had a cavity on it, and they don't usually put root canals on wisdom teeth. It was impossible anyway, in this case. It was my only cavity; my teeth were remarkably well kept considering how difficult they were be to clean, being crooked and all. I was told to get an x-ray and to come back for analysis and scheduling, which I immediately did.
From the x-ray, it was obvious my wisdom teeth were cartoonishly impacted. My lower 3rd molars were coming in sideways at a very slight DOWNWARD angle. There were just two very tiny off-white specks (actually the sides of my wisdom teeth) at the back of my lower jaw to visibly indicate that there were indeed teeth trying to erupt. They were otherwise completely buried in gum.
The dentist was taken aback for a bit and said the operation would probably be more complicated than usual. The price was P10,000 for removal of both lower and upper left wisdom teeth. After talking on the phone with my dad, the dentist agreed to do it for P8,000. I considered my self fortunate since I know people who had just one wisdom tooth extracted for 12k or more a pop.
So last Tuesday I went back to the dentist to have my left side wisdom teeth removed as scheduled.
I didn't know what to expect. i figured having wisdom teeth removed isn't as bad as most people make it out to be. It couldn't possibly be that bad. I was wrong.
It was terrifying.
I wasn't the least creeped out by the needles and the anesthetic and the drills, which most people people say are the worst things. I don't know about them, but it was totally different for me.
He gave me a local anesthetic first and asked me if certain parts of my mouth were numb. When I said yes, he began in earnest. a cut here, some drilling there. It was all interesting and not at all that unpleasant. Then he motioned to the nurse to hold my head in place. That's when my brain went :" Oh, sh..."
THWACK!
The hammer and chisel were the worst parts of the whole thing. He called the pair an Osteotome, but I know better. Every time he would bang on the chisel with the hammer to break the bone around my tooth, I experienced the worst pain I've ever experienced in my life.
Every time the dentist came at me with the hammer and chisel I was *this* close to peeing my pants. I was almost crying. I might actually have been crying like a baby but I was in too much pain to notice it. He kept telling me to keep my mouth open and to relax. I was trying the best I could but dammit if it wasn't impossible at the time.
He kept telling me "Dali na lang." but it was a lie. Between the umpteenth time he said it and the time he finished, it felt like forever. I could almost stand the taste of my powdered teeth and antiseptics, but the pain that came from whenever he used the hammer and chisel was unbearable. It felt just like it sounds. That and the sharp sensation of an icepick being stabbed into my left eardrum every time the hammer met the chiselhead. I found myself hoping against hope that I'd pass out.
Three times, with painful interludes of instrument manipulation in between, he picked out a bit of tooth from my mouth and I kept hoping it was over. No such luck. Countless hammerblows and drillings later, he picked out the last piece. He told me the lower tooth was done. I excitedly stamped my foot a few times on the floor from a lying position in joy.
Then he said he had to check for remaining pieces and he started poking around again. This time, he hit a nerve that he had managed to avoid since he started.
"AAAAHHH!!!" I went. He was visibly amused.
Most people are lucky. 3rd molar extraction of most types usually take an hour to less than 30 minutes by the dentist's estimate.
Well, I'm not most people. My kind of horizontal impaction was rare and was less than 4% of impacted 3rd molar cases. That's what the poster in the office said, anyway. And the whole ordeal for the lower tooth alone took a little under 2 hours 45 minutes.
Then anesthetic was applied somewhere at the back of my upper jaw. I had the whole trepidation thing now, given the experience I had mere minutes ago. He then took out something that looked like a pair of pliers, only it was more evil-looking. He then extracted my upper wisdom tooth. It was out before I knew it. I didn't even feel it come out. It took less than a minute. Only a few seconds, actually. Waiting for the anesthesia to act on my upper jaw took longer than it did to extract the tooth.
After the whole thing I sat on another chair in front of his desk and gave him an envelope with his fees in it and waited for my prescriptions to be filled out. I was told that my tooth and bone mass was extremely dense. He said he actually wore out a drill bit on me; I wasn't sure if he was joking but i just wanted to get the heck out of there. He then said did not expect the whole thing to take as long as it did; he estimated the whole thing to be two hours at the most.
I then asked the nurse for my tooth fragments. She gave me a resealable plastic bag with the requested contents. Most of them anyway. She misplaced on of the lower tooth fragments, to my annoyance. I decided not to complain. I then thanked everyone in the office and went home by trisikad.
To the dentist's credit, my jaw didn't swell to any extent that I'd noticed and I've all but fully recovered less than 3 days later. In fact, I'm having more trouble with the friction burns on the edges of my lips from the tools the nurse used to hold my mouth open than from my now empty gum sockets. Overall, he did very competent work and I've had no complications and he was really nice. It's just that now he looks like Josef Mengele to me.
When I got home, I gave my dad my prescription, spit out the bloody dressing they put in my mouth and tried to get some sleep. I realized that if I were to be tortured, I'd probably break down in a minute. If I were part of a revolution or something, all my comrades would be royally screwed if I were captured. Then the phone rang. It was my mom, telling me to inquire how much braces will cost because she'll pay for them.
That means eventually, I'll have to go through everything again.
omigodomigodomigodomigod.
The first thing I was told was that I needed braces. I guess a dentist of all people would have a vested interest getting people to put on braces, but in my case you don't need to be a dentist to know that I do. Second thing was that I needed to have my wisdom teeth removed because they were severely impacted and as a prerequisite for braces.
Next, I was told that my lower left wisdom tooth would have to be removed even if I didn't want braces anyway because it had a cavity on it, and they don't usually put root canals on wisdom teeth. It was impossible anyway, in this case. It was my only cavity; my teeth were remarkably well kept considering how difficult they were be to clean, being crooked and all. I was told to get an x-ray and to come back for analysis and scheduling, which I immediately did.
From the x-ray, it was obvious my wisdom teeth were cartoonishly impacted. My lower 3rd molars were coming in sideways at a very slight DOWNWARD angle. There were just two very tiny off-white specks (actually the sides of my wisdom teeth) at the back of my lower jaw to visibly indicate that there were indeed teeth trying to erupt. They were otherwise completely buried in gum.
Badly drawn representation of my teeth, courtesy of ME
The dentist was taken aback for a bit and said the operation would probably be more complicated than usual. The price was P10,000 for removal of both lower and upper left wisdom teeth. After talking on the phone with my dad, the dentist agreed to do it for P8,000. I considered my self fortunate since I know people who had just one wisdom tooth extracted for 12k or more a pop.
So last Tuesday I went back to the dentist to have my left side wisdom teeth removed as scheduled.
I didn't know what to expect. i figured having wisdom teeth removed isn't as bad as most people make it out to be. It couldn't possibly be that bad. I was wrong.
It was terrifying.
I wasn't the least creeped out by the needles and the anesthetic and the drills, which most people people say are the worst things. I don't know about them, but it was totally different for me.
He gave me a local anesthetic first and asked me if certain parts of my mouth were numb. When I said yes, he began in earnest. a cut here, some drilling there. It was all interesting and not at all that unpleasant. Then he motioned to the nurse to hold my head in place. That's when my brain went :" Oh, sh..."
THWACK!
The hammer and chisel were the worst parts of the whole thing. He called the pair an Osteotome, but I know better. Every time he would bang on the chisel with the hammer to break the bone around my tooth, I experienced the worst pain I've ever experienced in my life.
Every time the dentist came at me with the hammer and chisel I was *this* close to peeing my pants. I was almost crying. I might actually have been crying like a baby but I was in too much pain to notice it. He kept telling me to keep my mouth open and to relax. I was trying the best I could but dammit if it wasn't impossible at the time.
He kept telling me "Dali na lang." but it was a lie. Between the umpteenth time he said it and the time he finished, it felt like forever. I could almost stand the taste of my powdered teeth and antiseptics, but the pain that came from whenever he used the hammer and chisel was unbearable. It felt just like it sounds. That and the sharp sensation of an icepick being stabbed into my left eardrum every time the hammer met the chiselhead. I found myself hoping against hope that I'd pass out.
Three times, with painful interludes of instrument manipulation in between, he picked out a bit of tooth from my mouth and I kept hoping it was over. No such luck. Countless hammerblows and drillings later, he picked out the last piece. He told me the lower tooth was done. I excitedly stamped my foot a few times on the floor from a lying position in joy.
Then he said he had to check for remaining pieces and he started poking around again. This time, he hit a nerve that he had managed to avoid since he started.
"AAAAHHH!!!" I went. He was visibly amused.
Most people are lucky. 3rd molar extraction of most types usually take an hour to less than 30 minutes by the dentist's estimate.
Well, I'm not most people. My kind of horizontal impaction was rare and was less than 4% of impacted 3rd molar cases. That's what the poster in the office said, anyway. And the whole ordeal for the lower tooth alone took a little under 2 hours 45 minutes.
Then anesthetic was applied somewhere at the back of my upper jaw. I had the whole trepidation thing now, given the experience I had mere minutes ago. He then took out something that looked like a pair of pliers, only it was more evil-looking. He then extracted my upper wisdom tooth. It was out before I knew it. I didn't even feel it come out. It took less than a minute. Only a few seconds, actually. Waiting for the anesthesia to act on my upper jaw took longer than it did to extract the tooth.
After the whole thing I sat on another chair in front of his desk and gave him an envelope with his fees in it and waited for my prescriptions to be filled out. I was told that my tooth and bone mass was extremely dense. He said he actually wore out a drill bit on me; I wasn't sure if he was joking but i just wanted to get the heck out of there. He then said did not expect the whole thing to take as long as it did; he estimated the whole thing to be two hours at the most.
I then asked the nurse for my tooth fragments. She gave me a resealable plastic bag with the requested contents. Most of them anyway. She misplaced on of the lower tooth fragments, to my annoyance. I decided not to complain. I then thanked everyone in the office and went home by trisikad.
To the dentist's credit, my jaw didn't swell to any extent that I'd noticed and I've all but fully recovered less than 3 days later. In fact, I'm having more trouble with the friction burns on the edges of my lips from the tools the nurse used to hold my mouth open than from my now empty gum sockets. Overall, he did very competent work and I've had no complications and he was really nice. It's just that now he looks like Josef Mengele to me.
When I got home, I gave my dad my prescription, spit out the bloody dressing they put in my mouth and tried to get some sleep. I realized that if I were to be tortured, I'd probably break down in a minute. If I were part of a revolution or something, all my comrades would be royally screwed if I were captured. Then the phone rang. It was my mom, telling me to inquire how much braces will cost because she'll pay for them.
That means eventually, I'll have to go through everything again.
omigodomigodomigodomigod.
