Wet.

It has been raining steadily all day with no sign of the sun. When I drove up the hill in the afternoon it was straight into the clouds with very poor visibility. A quick look at the map puts the bottom of the cloud layer at about 200m.

I was off to town to visit the dentist but before that I stopped by a charity shop with yet another load of stuff to donate. As I pulled up by the shop I could see there were cars already parked in the 'loading only' space and was just about to sneak into the bus stop space which was a bit closer to the shop when I spotted a traffic warden. Fortunately there was enough space between the cars for me to fit into the loading space which brought me right next to the traffic warden. She could see that I was legitimately unloading and it didn't take long for me to empty the car. Then onwards I drove to the dentist. I was there  early as I planned to call in at the wine merchants next door to see if they had any cardboard boxes. Surprisingly they didn't, they get their wine on pallets and only have small 6 bottle boxes for their customers. However on the other side of the dentist is a paint and other decorating supplies place. The lady in there was only too happy to give me some large boxes.

At the dentist I was seen by a new chap who seemed very capable. Sadly the tooth where the piece of filling came out is cracked and he recommends having a crown. For the time being he put a temporary filling in as I haven't decided what to do. Not only does a crown cost nearly £250 compared to removal which is around £55 but there are no teeth underneath and it's quite far back. It's not so much the cost that puts me off but the length of the procedure that made me reluctant to agree straight away to have a crown. The other thing that I asked the dentist to check was what feels like a large hole behind another molar. Since I've been using some curved toothpicks I've been able to clean it out thoroughly but I was worried about the tooth. It turns out that the tooth is fine but the gum behind is ...... odd. He thinks that when I had my wisdom teeth out, 45 years ago, the gum was stitched in such a way to make a little pocket. Re-shaping the gum isn't something done under the NHS services but he will refer me to the dental department at the hospital. In the mean time he highly recommended the use of a water-pick (I know one reader who will be agreeing). I got him to show me which one to get and from which site as there are so many fakes around on the internet and something electrical which blasts my teeth needs to be of the highest quality. I've already ordered one, it should be very useful as I have odd gaps between my teeth which are difficult to keep clean.

When I got home everything was very damp. I had left a re-addressed magazine which had come for Vytas in the porch in case the post man came without us noticing. He hadn't but when I got home a large slug was on the plastic cover and had eaten its way though half of the label I had written the new address on, yuck. I threw the slug out and will have to write out yet another label.