Dentite Bites
All across this beautiful nation of ours people are getting stoned out of their gills. (Which, thanks to fantastic advances in high jinx pharmacological science they literally believe they have. Gills, I mean.) Some get so high, either by themselves or administered by their prostitutes) that they depart for a higher plane of existence.
Me? I’ll imbibe the occasional mint julep (in honor of Dr. Leonard McCoy) but that’s about as far as it goes. I don’t get high. I get even. And man, I am so even right now. But seriously, though, the best I ever accomplish is a temporary hit to my already questionable judgement. And a nap. Alcohol is always followed by a nap.
Beyond that, the only time I have need for drugs is when I’m in pain. P-A-I-N. Like when a tooth goes supernova. It’s the old arrow through the tooth routine. Ha ha.
But unlike every street rat and Silicon Valley exec, my choices are decidedly limited. I have abscess to anything as long as it literally does nothing (except, maybe, the side effects). What a deal!
So I call the dentist. It’s an “emergency,” I say. No problem! “How does Tuesday next week sound?” How does that sound? How about I feast on your soul with my last working tooth?
They always think I’m after the drugs. Yeah, people on the streets are scarfing pills like they’re Fruit Loops but I’m going to call you, my dentist, to get my fix on.
“Just take some over-the-counter stuff,” he says. As if the words uttered by a dentist actually makes them effective and gives them power. Acetaminophen. Ibuprofen. The words just roll off the tongue. Or they ought to for all the good they’ll do. Are you freaking kidding me? They just announced a study this week which revealed acetaminophen is no more effective for lower back pain than placebos. Which is unfortunate because acetaminophen is pretty much the #1 recommended analgesic for lower back pain. Oops. Our bad. (Which, by the way, you can’t spell analgesic without anal. Coincidence? Methinks not. Someone is too damn clever.)
How about you shove that OTC back in your analgesic, k?
I have a question. When you call the dentist why isn’t his response should be limited to one of two possibilities? 1) Come right in and I’ll work on you now and make it stop. 2) Come right in, I’ll take a quick look, and I’ll be happy to prescribe a serious pain reliever until I can see you sometime next week.
Why the hell don’t they do that?
My theory? It’s punishment. It’s the dental equivalent of dad grabbing the belt and taking me out behind the wood shed. Someone has gots to be learned a lesson. Maybe next time you won’t wait so long until you call? How many times do I have to drill this into you? This hurts you a whole lot more than it hurts me.
Today I saw the dentist and he readily agreed my mouth should be toured by the President in a helicopter after being declared eligible for disaster relief. “See? Aren’t you glad I made you wait?” Then I was finally handed a script for Tylenol-Codeine and admonished, “Be careful while taking these. Don’t try to drive or anything. This is powerful stuff.” Yeah, I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck, lady. I saw that episode of M*A*S*H, too. The one that went on to become a template for modern medical science. “Take these sugar pills and call us in the morning. Be careful! Powerful stuff!”
They say life is pain. But maybe that’s just because everyone except me gets abscess to the good stuff.
Yes, I replaced every instance of “access” with “abscess.” That’s my literary genius at work. I don’t even charge extra. -Ed.
Let’s weed ’em out
Coming soon to a state ballot near you: marijuana AKA cannabis.
Seems like all I hear these days is pro-legalization news. Pot was criminalized on a lie. Pot isn’t all that bad. Look what you can do with hemp. Driving while stoned isn’t as bad as being drunk. Yada yada yada.
Well, BAH FUCKING HUMBUG!
I often find myself on the wrong side of the popular vote. I guess that makes me a Lone Wolf. A renegade. A man outside the law. Meh.
How many laws are on the books that you don’t agree with? Well shit. What’s that got to do with it? Most laws in our country existed before I was even born. There was no “acceptance period” when I reached a certain age where I was ever asked which laws I agreed with and which ones I didn’t. That’s just tough noogies for me. I have to live with it. That’s life in a democracy like ours I guess.
When marijuana comes up for legalization in my neck of the woods – which is an inevitability – I will personally vote “hail no.” I find that shit utterly disgusting. I don’t like the way it smells, I don’t like the “culture” built around it, and I don’t understand the overwhelming desire to intoxicate oneself. For the record, however, I understand that some folks may have a legitimate need to ease pain and suffering in their lives. In that narrow definition I can support use. Of course, “medical marijuana” is one of the most abused concepts of all time. That makes it ever-so-tempting to shut the door on all use. The rest of this post has nothing to do with those who have a legitimate need.
I get it. Life sucks. Life is hard. Life is pain. But you can choose how you respond. You have choice. You have free will. You can decide to take on life and grapple with it. Or you can check out and go to La La Land and float on a cloud. In my ever so humble opinion the time spent on that cloud is time wasted. (Pun intended.)
I’ve been reading and hearing about the “whaaaaa!” situation in Humbolt County, California. The county is economically depressed. If it wasn’t for marijuana, proponents claim, the county would be even worse off economically than it is now. They say that marijuana is the county’s #1 cash crop. I saw a video of a self-styled Humbolt County “businessman” in a fucking suit extolling the virtues of the plant. Is it just me or did he take the easy way out by basing his livelihood on an illegal business, one that is highly profitable, and one that he now wants to legitimize and have a head start on corning the market? I could give a shit less about him. Me? I’m just a humble law-abiding citizen who’s salary is a pitiful fraction of his. Why the fuck should someone choosing to obey the law matter? Why should the criminal be rewarded?
According the Wikipedia’s cannabis page, marijuana is the #4 cash crop in the United States. Imagine the market that exists to support that? Wow. And in states like California, New York and Florida it is the #1 or #2 cash crop.
You know what that tells me? That too many damn people are spending too much damn money to intoxicate themselves and live on a cloud rather than deal with real life.
When you factor in what we spend on pot, alcohol, other illegal drugs, and abused pharmaceutical narcotics I can only imagine what a whopping number that must be. For completeness we should probably include cigarettes (perhaps the most addictive force known to humankind). Hell, throw in caffeine (Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Red Bull, etc.), too. It’s all drugs, right?
Stop and think about what we do as a society. The need to check out of reality is incredible. What if all the resources, time, money and energy spent on all that shit could be used for good? Can you imagine how different this world could be???
Shouts from the Abyss 
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