Swelling not too bad yet, but eating kind of sucks
After years of procrastination, this morning I underwent dental surgery to have two of my wisdom teeth removed. The two upper ones are still somewhere there, so hopefully I can still claim to be half wise. Last time I had a tooth removed I was barely a teenager, and, being in Brazil, had never heard about the Tooth Fairy at the time. If I only knew I could profit from all that pain…
I obviously took pictures of them and my gums after the procedure, but those photos just reinforced the idea that some things are better hidden in your personal hard drive rather than shared in Flickr, Facebook, TwitPic or WordPress – you’ve been spared from seeing very graphical images 😛 . Having said that, it’s amazing what you find about the little buggers in Wikipedia:
Wisdom teeth are vestigial third molars that human ancestors used to help in grinding down plant tissue. The common postulation is that the skulls of human ancestors had larger jaws with more teeth, which were possibly used to help chew down foliage to compensate for a lack of ability to efficiently digest the cellulose that makes up a plant cell wall. As human diets changed, smaller jaws gradually evolved, yet the third molars, or “wisdom teeth”, still commonly develop in human mouths. Agenesis of wisdom teeth in human populations ranges from practically zero in Tasmanians to nearly 100% in indigenous Mexicans. The difference is related to the PAX9 gene (and perhaps other genes).
At least that makes me feel a bit less primate now 🙂
After the surgery, I slept for most of the day because of the anaesthetics, and now am sleepless and craving everything I can’t eat. My dreams of surviving on Haagen Dazs ice cream and Lindt chocolate for the whole weekend were shattered: anything cold, hot or too sweet are still painful to ingest, so my mental motivation to finally go for the surgical procedure is now gone, and blogging here became the fall back alternative.
My small consolation is that this whole ordeal was not as painful as watching the complete meltdown Brazil had in the second half against the Netherlands in the FIFA World Cup last week. That one will take at least 4 years to heal.
The bamboo raft 
Hmm, I had all my wisdom teeth removed years ago (around the middle ages) so this explains my ongoing stupidity 🙂
Just took my 14 year old son to the dentist and looks like he has to get his wisdom tooth removed as it is blocking his last tooth from coming out. The dentist was explaining to us that maybe in a 100 years from now, humans may evolved to not even have any wisdom teeth anymore.
I hope you feel better soon and enjoy Haagen Dazs for the World Cup Final 🙂
Raton Perez will surely help the ball in 4 years for your lost wisdom teeth (the tooth fairy might have a dilemma with UK, USA etc…).
Ice cream seems a good idea with the kind of heat we are having, I hope you can eat it by now and that you are feeling better.
Ric, Reza, Béné,
Sorry for not responding to your comments earlier, life’s been busy, so only now I’m starting to remove the cobwebs from this blog. As Reza knows, this wisdom teeth thing became a long soap-opera and it’s still not fully healed.
Ric, I hope your son had better luck than me!
Reza, not all the Haagen Dazs in the world would compensate for Brazil being eliminated so early in the World Cup 😦
Béné, I did not know about Raton Perez! Thanks for bringing that up.