A Morning at the Dentist’s and Still in Search of Deleted Files

Wednesday, March 13, 2019

Bombay

A Morning at the Dentist’s and Still in Search of Deleted Files

Namaste from Bombay!

          The city is bidding winter farewell.  There is no longer the refreshing nip in the air when one awakes—a nip that guaranteed comfort for the rest of the day. Nope. It’s departing...and rapidly. Fans are now whirring away in church and I keep reminding myself that I need to shove into my bag my little sandalwood (Spanish-style) hand fan which had been my constant companion during the warm months.  For summer is well and truly on its way. They say here that Holi is the demarcating holiday that determines when the calendar has edged towards summer.  I am not looking forward to it...although with air-conditioning in my studio, I could not be more comfortable. I should try to be less of a whiner.

So, morning rituals were underway pretty quickly—I blogged, I breakfasted (on a broon with spreads when I heard the bread man’s bicycle bell)—he actually told me at the door that he rings his bell especially for my benefit!—and then I almost dressed for the gym, when I realized that I ought to give my bashed knee a break. I shall resume next week. The knee, by the way, is doing much better, thank-you. The pain is slowly receding (just as I knew it would) but the point of impact is still a bit painful.

Seeking Mental Equilibrium:

I used the time I would be at the gym to go through all my accumulated papers to see if I had the notes from all my interviews. I had—phew! I actually counted them and found them all intact. This was such a huge relief to me. Next, I collated them all into one envelope to keep them safe and also reviewed other materials that have accumulated to ensure that I am not holding on to anything unwanted—and I had not. This too was a huge relief. Staying organized is one of my biggest strengths—which is why I am still kicking myself for being so lax about not backing up my work. Anyway...that is water under the bridge now and I am learning to take it in my stride.   

After a shower, I got ready to go to Dad’s as I had a dental appointment with Dr. Sudha Shenoy and Dad wanted to accompany me to talk to the head of the dental practice, Dr Kher, about getting dental implants! Go Dad!

At the Dentist’s:

Dr. Sudha Shenoy is a darling! On going to her for my routine six-monthly check up last month, she had told me that there was nothing to clean! She did, however, do a full examination of my mouth and informed me that over-zealous brushing was causing tiny minor craters in my teeth along the gum line! So there really is such a thing as taking too much care of your teeth, People! Know this and refrain! She suggested I switch to a soft bristled brush (I use a battery-operated one) and use a lighter touch! Oh well. Meanwhile, the craters needed to be addressed.  If left them alone, they could become a trap for food particles that would lead, eventually, to cavities. So she suggested I get them filled with porcelain compound. I tried getting my regular hygienist in Connecticut, Mary, to give me her input on the matter...but Mary never did respond to me at all. So I decided that since my insurance needs me to bill them for the past year by March 31, I might as well get the matter seen to.

Hence, my visit with Sudha.  She ended up filling five teeth on one side: four at the top and one on the lower set of the right side of my mouth. I will return to her for the other side (3 in total) on Friday. Poor Dad! He sat outside for more than an hour while she worked on my teeth and probably got really fatigued and bored out there. 

When I was done—and Sudha did a splendid job—Dad and I had a meeting with Dr. Kher to discuss his potential implants. His mouth was examined and the good dentist said that after scanning his jaw to ascertain bone density, they could decide whether he would be a good candidate for the procedure.  Dad has no idea how big a deal implants are. When it was explained to him that all his top teeth would be removed—so that he would be toothless for almost three months—I honestly thought he would abandon the idea. But his chewing capacity is currently so poor that he is willing to give it a shot. Go Dad! 

When the doctor asked how old he is, He Who Seems To Be In A Hurry to get to the 90th milestone, said, “I will be starting 90 in May”. In other words, he will complete 89 in May! The doctor offered warm congratulations and after assessing the scan pronounced Dad fit to undergo the procedure. So next week, he shall have surgery, followed by three days of semi-solid diet. He will then need to wait for about three months before the actual new teeth can be inserted into his mouth. Wow! I am so impressed by my Dad’s tenacity. Did I not tell you all that he is a remarkable man who teaches me so much daily? Now I need to pray that all will go well with the surgery—next Monday—which is the main part of the procedure as it is the point at which the implants are inserted into the gums to be drilled deep down into the bone. All done with local anesthesia.  

Becoming Pro-Active About Oxford Webcam:

Back home, I attended to email (on my Ipad as my laptop is still with Himanshu). I tried to switch on the Oxford webcam and found out that, for the third day, there was no transmission from Oxford’s Martin School. The message I got on my TV when I tuned in on You Tube was, “The video has been interrupted. Streaming has stopped.” Being deprived of my happy place (at a time when I really do need to slip into one), I decided to get pro-active about it. I actually googled the Martin School and found an email address for a Media Person! So I decided to send her an email to find out what had happened to the camera and why it had stopped working. A few days ago, it was pouring quite hard in Oxford and I could see fat raindrops on the lens and condensation that created distorted images on the screen. I wondered if the camera had gone out of order with the rain. 

      Well, guess what? Within five minutes—five minutes!—I got an email response as she said she would look into the matter immediately.  And she did! Just ten minutes later, I got another email from her—transmission was  on again, she said. It was simple: the camera had been turned off (wwhhhyyy??) and was simply turned on again! So, there it was. A cloudy day in Oxford had already started to see people go about their business at almost 10.00 am. A few minutes later, the first Oxford City Sight-seeing bus veered into the frame and continued its tour down The Broad making its customary stop outside Christopher Wren’s Sheldonian Theater. Such a treat! Needless to say, I thanked the lady profusely and got a cheerful note back from her telling me to “enjoy”. Wow! I am simply amazed at the extent to which I went to get my window on Broad Street in Oxford back in my home again.  I hastily told Firdaus about it: but he was in Poona and told me he would check it out when he returned to Bombay.

I had lunch—dal, mince, spinach with corn—while watching various You Tube clips of Oxford Pubs and Tours and then sat on the phone trying to make appointments for more interviews. I contacted my friend Sam Kerawala who gave me a ton of numbers of people I now need to contact. I realize that I need to speed up my interviews as I have only about 6 weeks left before I will need to stop interviewing folks. If everyone does consent to give me interviews, I will be in good shape. Let’s hope so...

        

Back to Computer Blues:

By this time, it was 4pm and I had not yet heard back from Himanshu—so I decided to give him a call so that I could see where he stood before the evening was out. He told me that about 500 to 600 Word Documents were appearing and he asked me to come to his office to see where I stood. 

I took a bus there and ten minutes later, I was looking at my laptop. Yes, it is true that a lot of Word Documents had started to come up but all of them had been in some way connected to email associated with my NYU email account—and none of them were recovered files from my Trash! I had emailed my entire book manuscript, for instance, to an acquisitions editor—and so the entire book (all 300 pages of it came up!) This was good—but I had already found an edited version that I had sent to another publisher about a month ago. The one I had found was a more recent version —so the one that came up was redundant! No Word Documents attached to my Optonline account had come up. So, huge disappointment there, although it served to assure me that some of my lost material could be retrieved and saved. Actually, a lot of what came up were my students’ papers that had been sent to me through the ages—things I did not need. My own deleted files are still hiding in some corner of my hard drive and proving to be very difficult to access. Anyway, Himanshu told me that he had interrupted the scanning process so that I could look at the files. He also said that he will resume it in the hope that some of my deleted files will appear. Well...I can only hope! I will know by tomorrow same time where I stand with regards to my deleted files! As you can see, this drama is being stretched out...but I am now strangely calm and very fatalistic about it. Que Sera Sera...what will be, will be.

When I returned from Himanshu’s place—feeling far happier than I have been in days—I got home to a pot of hot tea and some nuts. Then, a little later, I went straight to church for the 7.45 pm Novena followed by Mass.  Dad and I walked back together—he was in a hurry to return to his cricket match—and I got home to watch another episode of The Sinner (getting really terribly sinister and scary now) and another episode of Grace and Frankie as I needed some kind of levity before going to bed with such frightful images in my mind.

I was asleep soon after.

Until tomorrow...