-what would i do without weekends?

-thankful for a snow day last thursday

-tom came to check out the clinic on friday. makes me wonder what it will be like to have 20 years of knowledge and learning from successes/mistakes. and also makes me thankful that i've been able to learn kingdom values at a young age. not that it's any grounds to be proud. but i'd rather live for christ now and not have to think about the woulda/shoulda/coulda later.
doesn't mean that living for christ entails all the external things. because God is trying to tell me that it's really about His dwelling in hearts. (went to two churches this morning. got in touch with my black side at epiphany. then got in touch with my white side at liberti. then realized that i need to let go of whatever residue of guilt i might feel with going to other churches, as if cheating on my church where i have membership, or something. and both messages, expressed very differently, were about Jesus being on the throne of our hearts.)

-patient S returned last week. she's the one who talked about how school was 'corny' and she goes to school 'with criminals'. i have a series of questions that i always ask, it's kind of robotic now. sometimes the patients forget what i ask them (if it's every 6 months). but more often than not, people expect me to remember everything that we talk about. which i understand, since i can remember my convos with my dentist. honestly, though, having 10-20 people to talk to... it's hard to keep track of it all in my aging adult brain. so i spewed out my usual, "did you get any homework today?" and she responds with, "i tooold you! i don't get any homework!!!" so i quickly fire, "did anything interesting happen at school today?"
s: "no. i toooold you, school is boring."
me: "but i thought you went to school with criminals!" (1 point for me, remembering what she had mentioned in previous convo)
s: "ooh. you mean THAT kind of interesting. it's no longer interesting to me if i see it every day."
good point there, s.
s: "one girl was getting jumped by a bunch of people. everyone ran upstairs to see what was going on. so i ran upstairs to see too."
a-ha! you must have been interested enough to run up and check out the hoopla.
s continues: "her face got messed up."
sad. but interesting, i suppose.
still not sure what is the best way to respond to these stories. so i just let S know that i'm glad she is staying out of trouble.
but she really needs to take better care of her teeth.

-O came by very anxious because he needs 2 teeth out (was assaulted by 3 coworkers at work a couple years ago, broke his two front teeth). i felt so bad because i was explaining the treatment plans and costs, and he started sweating.

-E came back after a long hiatus. her dad reports she's been crying in her bed because of tooth pain. her mom told him to take E to the dentist once he had some time off. it's been difficult because he's been plowing snow for the city for the last 72 hours, not much of a break and not much sleep. (the quality of philadelphia snow plowing does not compare to michigan. i never felt like i needed to carry a shovel in my car in michigan because plowing is neater and more efficient. more practice, i guess. but in philly, i'm considering getting one to store in the trunk. i dunno if the state of the roads are exacerbated by the fact that it's a little warmer here, so the snow does tend to be in the slush state longer. but i think i will need a new bumper sooner than later.) back to E. she came wearing her hello kitty jacket. monin made a comment about, "ooh! i like your hello kitty jacket." E looks at me and blurts, "remember you told me about hello kitty in china?!"
i don't think i told her about hello kitty in china. i probably mentioned that hello kitty has a boyfriend, named dear daniel. and that helly kitty has an empire in japan (hk airplane, hk land theme park, hk kitchen appliances, hk computers... etc).
i remember telling a little girl sometime last winter that i would bring her a stuffed hello kitty doll, that was sitting in my drawer in ann arbor. i couldn't remember who it was. so i asked if it was her. she said "yes", hesitatingly. and her dad confirmed it. which leads me to believe that it wasn't her. because there was definitely not a dad around during that first visit.
anyway, she needed to come back to get some fillings. and when people don't come back right away, things start to hurt. she was in so much pain. so i gave it to her anyway. it's kind of a limited edition hello kitty, only sold in hokkaido. i told E that. and her dad was super impressed that he took it from her.
so, dad's snow plowing friends are going to make fun of him for being a grown man with a hello kitty plush doll on his keychain.