It’s been a tough one here in chiggerville today. I slept in again even though I got to bed at a decent hour. I don’t have the luxury of sleeping in tomorrow, though, as I have a dentist appointment at 8:00 a.m. in southwest Rogers (my filling didn’t solve the issue, or they didn’t adjust it well, but I don’t think it solved the issue as the symptom is nearly identical, so I’m back for a follow up tomorrow. Hopefully, they’ll figure it out, as I can’t really eat on the right side of my mouth right now without pain if it’s anything even remotely chewy or crunchy.
So… cross your fingers they’ll figure it out.
You know… there are a couple of things I’ve wondered… Dentists have been around for ages and ages. Why is it that they still check your bite after a filling while you’re lying down? Your bit is different when lying down than when vertical. It’s… I just don’t understand. Is it shear laziness? Don’t want to raise the bed to check the bite only to lower it to make the adjustments? (up down up down?) I just… don’t understand. I think I’ve only ever been to one dentist who would raise me up to check the bite.
The other thing… why do they use that thick hard plastic thing to look for sensitive spots? I’ve just about never been able to trigger the sensitive spots with that fat hard thing. It’s… all but useless, it seems to me. What they need is a flexible, very thing strip with a blackberry seed sized thingy in it. That would pinpoint the issue. Why? Because it’s just about always blackberry-seed-sized food (or blackberry seeds themselves) that cause the pain.
I’m not a dentist, but… why are these things not standard? It’s… I don’t know. Maybe someone can read this and make a billion dollars selling improved procedural and diagnostic stuff for dentists.
Tangent.
Removed the AC condenser out of my moms Juke this morning before heading out to work. It was much easier than I thought it would be, which was fabulous. Then I went to the DMV to turn in my trailer VIN doc now that I have put the vin plate on it. So… all the paperwork is good to go, and the only things left the trailer needs is wiring for the brakes and posts to keep the back end from going down and lifting my truck off the ground when I drive a piece of heavy equipment up onto my trailer.
Oh… I also need to wire in the brake controller into my truck, but that’s… not related to the trailer itself…
Then it was on to my first job, which turned out to be my only job because, #1. It was a really hard job anyway, and #2. After I was completely done, even though I’d had the alternator tested before it came over to me, I finished the whole job (5 hours or so of work), and guess what? Dead short. But where?!?! They said they’d tested the alternator before it was taken to me. What… what could have happened? Dead short in? Ba ba da ba…. yeah… the voltage regulator on the alternator. Plug it in and boom…. dead short. So… five hours… out the door. And a bunch of wasted time trying to figure out what the issue was. Altogether, it ended up with over 7 hours at that car before it started to get dark, and I didn’t have another part anyway. Ugh.
That. Was. Really. Frustrating. I even had the blasted alternator tested before it came to me, but… nope. My extra precautions didn’t help me at all. Ugh.
So… fortunately, my customer decided to get a new one instead of a reman one, so that’ll hopefully make things better tomorrow. Hopefully, we’ll have a good alternator out of the box, but now I’m all nervous. I’m gonna hook the alternator up prior to installation to see what happens, see if it shorts out or not.
Anyway, rough day with that today. Long hard day.
When I came home, I decided to get my redneck on. I bought a light bar (like you’d see on a pickup truck for driving off road at night. And guess what I did? Yup… wired it up to the riding lawnmower. The lawnmower has had the headlights working either not at all or sporadically since I moved here, but now? Super super super bright lights. So now we can mow in the dusk/evening when it’s much cooler outside. The only question is whether or not the lawnmower’s alternator can handle charging that light. It’s 126 watts, so I’d guess so, but we’ll see. 126 watts of LED power, and another push button. We now have a push-button start, and now these push-button headlights.
Redneck lawnmower. π Get your redneck on! π
Title for the ’02 Ford E350 came today, so I’ll get that listed for sale and get it gone. That’ll be nice to have gone, so it’s not taking up space up there by the carriage barn. Too many of my things are migrating up that way.
(deep breath)
It’s been a long day. I’ve been struggling a lot with my faith on the existence of God lately. That’s been… a challenge. I’m so quick to throw away my experiences… so quick to doubt, so quick to fear. I have experiences you can’t really question? But I find a way to all the time, and then I struggle. And I have been.
Gratefully, God or no God, I’m me and always will be me. Who I want to be is love, and that will be the case regardless of what is or is not true.
Well… it’s late, and I badly need a shower because I’m super nasty dirty.
Loves and hugs. π
Lift the World
~ stephen
ο»Ώ
Lift the World 
I love you, Stephen! Maybe your issues of faith are because you are trying to believe in someone else’s idea of God? Don’t discount your experience, but don’t try to fit God into the box of someone else’s belief. Just as culture has progressed beyond patriarchy, perhaps the idea of God can be bigger, too. For me, God is the underlying entity of the universe, the life force of all living things, manifesting as love for those willing to remember who they are. Anyway, that belief comforts me, helps me treat others with reverence and respect. Namaste!
Thanks, Tish π I appreciate your thoughtfulness and your willingness to share this journey with me. π Thanks, for your loving, encouraging thoughts that you share so often. π
I think my ideals about who/what God is are pretty independent, believe it or not. π Perhaps I don’t recognize it if that’s not true (which I would want to know because truth and love are…. so so much.), but I’m pretty independent, and most of what I believe or think I know about the universe and God actually didn’t come from what others have taught me, I don’t think? I’ve sort of formulated my own framework for what/who God is, and I measure what others share/teach against that, my experience, what I believe.
But it’s been hard because I’ve had many experiences that I thought I understood clearly were of God, only to find out that either they were, and I misunderstood them (quite possible), or they… weren’t. And… some of them involve things that are related to some of my deepest wants, and when I get stuff wrong, or I misunderstand… then I tend to throw babies and bath water and kitchen sinks all out the door, and I question everything again. I’m a pretty good reasoner, and I can logically/intellectually reason my way in and out of just about anything being true.
That can be… challenging. π
If there is a God, and most of the time I believe there is, then that God is love, loving every person and creature with a love so deep that I can only imagine what it could be. If God isn’t that… then… well…. that really would be… awful. And I suppose I could be understanding of a less-than-perfect God, as I myself am obviously far from where I want to be, but I certainly would want there to be a infinitely loving God.
There’s a mountain’s worth more I could say, but maybe another time. It’s late. G’night, Tish! π