TOR:

I can't talk properly or eat solid food for a week because I just had my wisdom tooth operation yesterday. I had 3 teeth out in shards after an arduous surigical operation. For the record-- it was very painful. It felt like parts of my skull and cheekbone were being carved away and wrenched out of my head, which is in effect what happened. I could feel the dentist drilling deep into my jaw. I'm afraid I screamed several times. Some kindly nurses popped in after to calm my blubbering self down. It was all very embarrassing. My mother said it sounded like they were sa-ing zhu in there, i.e. killing pig. I couldn't feel my gums and flesh, but I could feel, in my nerves, the bones in my face being sawn apart.

I heard the dentist ask for bigger pliers twice while violently chiseling into my lower right tooth, shattering it into easy-to-wrench bits. Because my teeth were so close to my nerves, I could feel the drill bit every inch of the way. And there was nothing anyone could do about the pain, since it is not possible to numb the whole damn nerve. This is not a kua-zhang-ated account. I'm already 24-- hard bones; more drilling.

Of course you'd expect me to be on a soft mushy diet of congee, congee and more congee. But in fact I've been able to get away with having more tasty, yet still liquidy stuff without having to resort to rice porridge. Initially, I thought I would be able to lose weight by not eating much during my week of recovery, but this doesn't seem so likely now. With a bit of imagination, it's amazing what yummy (fattening) foods you can think of which do not require chewing.


Vic's recommended diet for the wisdom-toothless convalescent(mastication unnecessary):

Day 1-- post-op

Dinner: Milo cereal drink +mango apple juice for vitamins
Supper: Low-fat hot chocolate drink

Day 2

Breakfast: Orange juice + horlicks energy drink
Lunch: Mashed banana + Birds' nest soup
Dinner: Sharks' fin soup (fake-- from J8 downstairs stall) + bak jio (spicy pork paste-- like mashed up bak ting)

Day 3

Breakfast: Apple pureé + marigold yoghurt drink-- passionfruit and pear flavour
Lunch: Dao huay (beancurd dessert) from Jollibean + orange juice
Dinner: Oyster mee sua from taiwanese chicken shop. (without oyster)

Day 4

Breakfast: Kopi + soft boiled egg from Ya Kun
Lunch: Brekkie To Go smoothie from Boost! (banana, vanilla low fat frozen yoghurt, muesli, milk, honey, ice + I will ask for a spoonful of chocolate)
Dinner: mashed potato + chicken gravy (ready-made from NTUC) + Tow Kae Noi seaweed (melts in mouth)

Day 5

Breakfast: Milk + Khong Guan egg rolls softened in milk
Lunch: Barley drink with dao huay from Ya Kun
Dinner: extremely cooked vegetable stew (easily mashable cauliflower, potato and carrot)


Even a wisdom tooth operation that's left me with chipmunk cheeks, holes in my gums and painful stitches that click when I laugh hasn't dampened my appetite. But I'm not hungrier than I usually am since my present diet is not actually that far off from what I would eat normally anyway. I am so not going to lose any weight lor.

My only gripe with my ravaged gums is that the ache goes right down to the holes in my jaw and cheek bones and it hurts when I laugh, smile, sneeze, cough, yawn or talk like a normal person. I can only speak in a wierd, sleazy, muffled way, through clenched teeth, without really moving my mouth. That's actually worse than my inability to eat solid food, since I've demonstrated that there's a good variety of tasty non-solid foods available in our fair country. It's times like this that I give thanks for the virtues of our bounteous island-state. Can you imagine being in angmoh-land with holes in your gums? You'd be stuck with going to chinatown for pei-dan chok, pei-dan chok and more pei-dan chok!*



*Ok, ok, I jest. I'm sure there's lots of ang-moh food for convalescents, e.g. angmoh soups, porridge, cauliflower pureé, mushy peas, Heinz baby food...

Interesting Things that Have Happened

Tor went for wisdom tooth surgery today. She's ok but still in pain and wants to eat Old Chang Kee curry puffs, as expected. I hope she doesn't bleed all over her pillows tonight, like I did that time I got my last molar extracted.

Bar manager is ill. There is something disconcerting (but at the same time funny), about a heavy set, bald man looking miserable while nursing a cup of tea. He used to be a bouncer, at that.

Peter our dish washer got hit by a motorcycle this morning, on the way to work. He's now in hospital with a broken leg. You'd think that accidents were more likely to happen in a kitchen right? I pointed this out but everyone thinks I'm mad. Hallo, what's the use of fretting? It's just a broken leg, we're not some third world country where you'll get gangrene and die from it.

The various bits of my life are fixing themselves. Also, to date I have conditional acceptance into 2 universities, having applied for 7.

Methinks '07 is starting out pretty good, all things considered.

I never thought the lack of something mentally challenging would drive me nuts. Now the memo pad I use to jot down orders is filled with random scribbles, some of which will make it to the journal in due time. It's starting to resemble my school notepad (or any of the A4 notebooks I used for Lit). Examples of my downtime mental excrement:

Rebound is Bad For You
Starfuckers is Much Love!
Get out of my head, please
and
"Anything red compels us", being from Atwood's Good Bones, a fantastic book that I'm actually planning to buy.

Along with lists of things to do, like "find out what's wrong with iTunes" or "buy new clothes". The latter is due to the fact that I'm losing weight at an alarming rate. I'm eating more, more often (I do work at a restaurant), so it doesn't make sense. This does not combine well with being in an environment I'm not comfortable in yet.

And I need to start WoWing again, or my hormone levels will become unbalanced. Bloody hell, I really need to frostbolt something to death.

I Like My Job.

It isn't perfect or anything fantastic, but it's everything a job should be. Crappy managers, unhappy collegues and not much of a life. That's the point, isn't it? On the other hand, I am very fond of the people I work with, like Sophie and Diana, making this a major reason why I Like My Job. Ok, maybe also too fond of a particular Boy but he only works Saturdays.

I am Not Unhappy with this job, but I just might move, in a while. The managers are really pissing us off and it's ok for them to lose us, since they've got about 50 new applicants in the last few weeks.

I've learnt alot of new things:

Waitressing is not always thankless.
Managers are the spawn of Satan.
The people who own the store are nicer than managers, obviously. They generally have less to stress about.
Guys behind the bar shaking up a martini automatically become Hot. (it works like a +5 charisma or something.)
Carrying 10 cups with one arm is really, dead easy.

Okok, I work at Bungalow, United Square. Ground floor, in the corner where the large beige tents are. We're more a bar than restaurant, though people keep thinking otherwise. Exhaustive list of alcohols and mixes, 4 types of sangria and 3 colours of absinthe might interest some people I know. Our Penffold and One Tree wines also seem very popular with customers.

We open at 11 everyday, close at 11 on Sundays to Thursdays, 2 on Fridays and Saturdays. Last orders for kitchen 9.45pm.

Ok, I quite like my job. For now, at least.

So the place I work at has a bar. I had half a bottle of Asahi, my mum smells it on me and thinks I'm turning into an alcoholic. And if I'm the slightest bit late she freaks if I don't call home. What's the point of asking me to get a job if you don't trust me enough to take care of myself from work to home, in a cab. Cab fare is also free because the management pays.

I start work at 3 and end at midnight everyday til Saturday, the 13th. So don't ask me out for prata or drinks or a movie or whatever unless it's before or after work. Thanks.