We got up this morning around 7 AM to temperatures in the upper 50’s and thinly overcast skies.  I hooked up the garden hose and watered part of the back yard where we have been spot seeding the grass.  Breakfast was our usual yummy homemade granola and a fresh grapefruit but I had to eat the cereal carefully.

I woke up this morning with minor pain in my lower right rear teeth.  The upper teeth on that side have been bothering me for a little while and the coffee bothered one of them this morning.  Not a good sign, as we learned a few weeks ago when Linda developed severe pain overnight.  Sensitivity to heat and lack of sensitivity to cold is one of the tests for a nerve gone bad, and that usually means a root canal procedure.  I called our dentist’s office at 9:15 AM and they booked me in at 2 PM.  When I was there a couple of weeks ago to have an abfraction redone Dr. Steve did not see anything wrong with the upper tooth and speculated that I might be clenching my teeth while I sleep, which can aggravate the nerves.  He may want me to try a mouth guard first.  We’ll see.

After catching up on blogs I finished watering the back yard and moved around to the front.  Being on a well, we cannot just run the water indefinitely; once the pressure tank runs down we need to let it recharge.  The tank is large and we never notice this with normal household water usage, but watering the lawn can take a lot of water.

With the watering done I had planned to work on the drywall in the library, something I have not done for the last week, but I decided instead to re-grade a small area of the yard just east of the east driveway culvert.  Roese Construction brought two pieces of plastic gas line above the surface in that area, dug a big hole to connect them straight together, and then back filled the hole and buried them.  In the process of filling and grading the disturbed area they blocked the lower half of our culvert.  Unfortunately the water flows out of that end of the culvert, so their grading was blocking the natural flow of the water.

While I was digging and raking Bill showed up from AT&T.  Linda let me know that about 20 minutes before he arrived we had gotten two calls that just identified as “Incoming.”  Bill said that coincided with the time he was dispatched and that an automatic line test is run whenever a technician is dispatched.  He was able to pull up a screen on his diagnostic tablet of the recent use of the line pairs by 30 minute intervals and could see that our DSL had dropped out shortly after the diagnostic calls were made.  This matched what Linda had seen in the house.  He repeated the test sitting in our driveway and the telephone test call caused our DSL to disconnect again.  He disconnected the line from the service entrance box and went in search of the problem while I continued working on the drainage issue.

I had the drainage problem fixed by 11:45 AM and got cleaned up and dressed appropriately for my dental appointment.  We had hummus sandwiches with onion and olive oil, leftover butternut squash from last night’s dinner, and fresh, perfectly ripe pears; all soft foods so as not aggregate my dental situation.  I was just getting ready to leave for my appointment when Bill returned.  He said it was not a circuit board but appeared to be a cable problem that they refer to as a “swinging line,” referring to a marginal section of cable that develops problems when it moves, such as with storm winds.  We had problems on Friday evening as a storm front approached and the winds kicked up, so this diagnosis did not surprise me.

Bill said he moved us to yet another line pair much farther away from our original ones and then repeated the tests he had done earlier.  He had not gotten any failures but was not completely confident that he had solved the problem.  The weather forecast for tomorrow is for a 100% chance of storms, some strong to severe, and Bill thought that would be a good test.  I let Bill know that while I was digging and raking by the road I found an old underground AT&T line that had been cut in half with ends left above ground.  He said it was no longer being used but they ask the other utility crews to leave the ends exposed when they snag them so AT&T can find them.

My teeth hurt on the drive down to the dentist, did not hurt while I was there, and hurt on the drive home.  Direct examination, hot/cold sensitivity testing, and X-rays did not provide a definitive diagnosis.  Dr. Steve was still of the opinion that it could be nerve irritation from clenching my teeth at night, but thought I should have the situation evaluated by an endodontist.  Linda saw an endodontist just down the street from our dental clinic, but she needed same day service and they were able to get her in and do the root canal.  They referred me to a clinic in Brighton about five miles from our house and made an appointment for me for Thursday late morning.  With any luck my teeth won’t go critical in between now and then.

I did get an interesting recommendation on how to manage any ongoing discomfort.  Motrin (Ibuprofen), up to 800 mg every six hours, and Extra Strength Tylenol, every six hours, taken half way between the Motrin.  Apparently it works nearly as well as narcotics, at least on dental pain, without any of the unpleasant side effects or habit forming properties.

I did not feel like changing back into work clothes when I got home so I enjoyed some quiet time on the deck with Linda, who was working on her counted cross-stitch project, under partly cloudy skies with pleasant temperatures in the mid-70’s and a light breeze.  Ahhhh.

With the phone and DSL currently functioning properly I worked in my office for a while before dinner.  The login attack on our two WordPress sites hosted by QTH.com had continued, but not to the same extent as before.  I set the country blocking to “all” in Wordfence and then deselected the U.S., Canada, and Mexico.  I did not have a reply from Scott at QTH.com which surprised me a bit but was not a big deal.

Linda made a nice salad for dinner and then served the leftover baked squash and squash/pasta dish from the other night; a lot of squash for one meal, but very tasty.  We had a glass of the Leelanau Cellars Winter White, a very drinkable semi-sweet white table wine blend that must contain a fair amount of Riesling, although the label does not specify the grapes used to make it.

My bottom tooth was really acting up so I took 800 mg of Motrin (Ibuprofen) around 6 PM.  We were out of Extra Strength Tylenol so Linda went to the store and got a bottle.  I took some of that around 9 PM and then went to bed.  I will be taking a pass on wine and coffee until I get the problems with my teeth resolved.