Adventures in Dentistry & Other Fun

Since school starts two weeks from today (watch me do cartwheels and dance around the house for joy!), it's the time of year where we have to get all the checkups and such done for the kiddies. Normally it isn't a big deal because we've got health insurance, but we've been bad and slacking on the dentist visits. Neither CB nor I work at a company that provides Dental insurance, so we just haven't taken the time to get to the dentist. Plus, it's an expense that I HATE with a fiery passion. Even when we had dental, I went one time. But, I don't want to inflict my hatred of all things dentist-related onto the kids, so I scheduled them checkups. CB has had some mouth pain lately too, so the three of them had appointments this morning.

An hour and a half later, we walked out of there with an $1,800 bill. Then I died.

I'm certain that daggers shot out of my eyes because it is so insane how much it costs to have someone look at your teeth. Even if CB wouldn't have had TEN CAVITIES (!), it would have cost at least $250. That's crazy for an hour and a half of work! CB joked that he's going to just tell the dentist to rip all his teeth out & he'll make himself a set of titanium dentures. Yeah, because that's hella sexy, hon.

CJ only had one cavity, and although Diva was cavity-free, she's got an underbite. Which means that five years down the line we'll be paying for the dentist's vacation home by getting her braces. Gah!

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Now, onto the actual fun part. Last week, CB got a phone call from his dad (we'll call him Country Dad). CD was sharing with CB that he'd just bought a new(ish) boat. If the conversation had ended there, I would have had to listen to CB whine for the next month about how his dad gets to have all the fun and it sucks because we have this KIDS that are so friggin' expensive, blah, blah, blah. Then I would have shot him because I am so sick of the damn whining in this house and I would have been writing this entry from jail.

But CD couldn't get anything for a trade in on his old boat, and he GAVE it to CB. Just gave it to him for free. So now we have this pretty nice boat--considering that it's twenty-some years old and a fishing boat. But it goes fast enough to tube behind and is in excellent condition.

Needless to say Saturday and Sunday were spent at the lake. I took advantage of it on Saturday and went shopping. Although it wasn't much fun because the kids were whiney (see? I'm sick of the whine! I need WINE to make the whine not so damn annoying) and crabby, which makes me crabby. But I got some pretty good deals and they are now more than set for school clothes.

Sunday it was beautiful out, so I went out on the lake too. And for a few hours, I actually enjoyed the beauty of this state. It's the land of 10,000 lakes, and a vast majority of the really nice ones are located within an hour of us. The one we were at on Sunday is big, but it's pretty quiet. The sky was a perfect bright blue with big puffy clouds and the water was cool and not disgusting (which is a feat in and of itself by this point in the summer). I sat in the boat, the little waves rocking us back and forth and realized this is an OK life. If every weekend could be like that, I could handle living in this small town of big mouths. And then the kids started getting bored. I seriously considered jumping in the water and swimming away. But I didn't. And we all came home, relaxed and drained from the sun. I slept like a rock for the first time in a long time. That, my friends, is what I call a perfect way to end a weekend.