Well, Andy was wrong. He told me I had no idea how painful it was to have braces put on. That’s what he, Jai, and others have said that have had braces. Andy thinks everything’s painful, though, and likes to tell people they’re gonna be in pain. Anyway, it wasn’t painful at all. Not really even uncomfortable, either. The only cons to it were that it took an hour and a half, which felt like 5 hours, the cleaners they put on the teeth tasted nasty, and they feel weird. They’re gonna take some getting used to, and I suppose singing will feel a bit strange, too.

Another bummer is that even non-stick gum gets caught in the braces. Thank God it’s been a whole 5 months since I quit and that I don’t miss the damn things and aren’t as addicted to gum like I was the first 3 and a half months after quitting. I’ll be switching to Tic-Tac Mints instead. My teeth aren’t sore, but they are if I try to chew gum.

I got colorful braces, too. The braces themselves are traditional metal, but the bands under and around them are plastic and colored. She rotated colors - pink, purple and blue. As Tom pointed out, they look like little gemstones. I referred to myself as Brace Face at one point and Tom said he likes Wiremouth better. OK. Whatever.

Tom and I discussed it and in a year or two, I’m gonna go for it and get my crooked bottom teeth straightened out as well!

The bonus to having this shit done is that Miss Gorgeous herself is the one doing it. The doc came in to check things out, but other than that, she does all the ortho. Her name is Melanie Marie Something and she’s 27, has had braces herself and has nice teeth, has nice brown eyes (has a nice face, for that matter), has long brown curly hair, is about 5’ 6”, and is married. I was surprised too, but sometimes people you don’t think would be married, are married. She just seems the single type. Anyway, she’s been doing what she does for 8 years and I’m glad I get to stick with the same person (she says she’s sure she’ll be there forever) cuz then I feel more comfortable.

Anyway, I’ll have the braces on for a year, give or take a few months. Some people’s teeth move faster than others. After the braces come off, I’ll be wearing a retainer for a year, then just at night. She said it only took her a few days to get used to her braces.

She gave me a kit that contains a toothbrush for traveling, a regular toothbrush, and a little one with just a few bristles on it for cleaning the braces. There were also things to thread the floss behind the wires so I can floss easily, not that I ever really do. And lastly, she gave me some wax for the pointy parts. The brackets on the back molars that anchor the bands and wires have a pointy part that kind of scrapes my tongue, so I wax that part.

Nonetheless, I’m glad I’m getting this out of the way and again, I’m really glad I don’t have a child to bog me down and make things like this and our moving plans even harder to do. You hear of so many people whose plans were shot cuz they found out they were pregnant. The plan is to buy the land in about a year, give or take a few months, then live in a mobile home for a few months while we build a small house. Then we’d move into the small house while we built the final, bigger house. Then the small house would become a guest house.

Later...

Tom got a new job within the bank. It’s not so much a new job, but he’s gonna be the boss of his shift, which consists of 2-3 people, cuz the guy that’s been the boss of the shift, has left. So his hours will hopefully stabilize. He may work more like 2 AM - 10 AM. He’ll get to have more say in his schedule. And a raise, too.

Mom’s gonna be sending packages of stuff she’s not taking to the new house. One of them is on its way.

Thank God Tom’s different and so easy to please, cuz any other guy probably would’ve been pissed about last night. Tom said he’d like to eat, digest, then have fun around midnight, but come 11:00 I was beat and ended up crashing on the poor guy!

I hear Tweety filing his beak.