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                           Spring Break in Hell
        A lot of college kids go to Florida for spring break.  Some take a long
plane flight to Hawaii or Guam or possibly Andorra.  I've had my fun, been on
breaks where partying is the only order of business, and to tell you the truth,
I thought it was getting kind of old.  Not only do you fail to accomplish
anything, you end up getting back more tired and washed out than when you left.
This vacation was going to be different.  This time, I was going to get my
wisdom teeth extracted and spend the whole week lounging around the house
really relaxing.  I couldn't wait.
        So I woke up early Monday morning at nine, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed
and ready for some real spring break fun. I made sure not to eat or drink
anything, and my mom took me down to the doctor's office because I was told I
wouldn't be fit to drive after the surgery when I made the appointment. Imagine
my surprise when the following dialog ensued upon entering the office:
        "Hi, I'm Chris Boraski, here for my appointment."
        "Umm.   Okay. Be with you in a
moment."  The glass door slides shut, closing all further communication.  I
take a seat and wait for some response.  A few minutes later, the glass door
slides open and a head peeks out."
        "Umm.  Did you have an appointment?"
        "Yes."
        "Just wanted have the teeth checked, then?"
        "Nope, I'm here to have three wisdom teeth pulled."
        "Have you ever been here before?"
        "Yes!"  At this point I should have just walked out of there, cut my
losses, and driven down to Florida.  But I have my pride, and I really planned
on enjoying the extraction, so I stuck it out.  The nurse walked away and came
back a minute or two later.
        "Okay, I've found your file, and I talked to the doctor, and he said
he'd squeeze you in between the 9:15 and the 9:30."
        "You sure you don't want me to come back another time?"
        "No, as long as you have mon.. er I mean, no, now is quite convenient."
        "Oh...Okay...I guess."  So I'm shuttled into the doctor's office and
plopped down in the chair.  The nurse straps me in and pulls up an x-ray I had
gotten a few weeks ago.  The doctor rushes in, finishing his coffee, and takes
a quick look at the x-ray.
        "Dum-de-dum-de-dum.  Okay.  Right.  So it'll be two lowers and the
upper right wisdom teeth correct."
        "Actually, I think you've got the x-ray upside-down, doctor."
        "Right, right.  That nurse is a crazy cat this early in
the morning, eh?  Okay then, both uppers, and the lower left."
        "Yeah, something like that."  I was starting to feel like just another
bad muffler in a Midas shop, but this wasn't the first time I've been subjected
to less than perfect customer service so I took it with a grain of salt.
Meanwhile, the nurse had been hooking me up to the IV and was having a hard
time getting the oxygen tubes in my nose. The doctor had to help her out with
that one.
        "So you see:  In the nose, and then around the ears. Got it now?"
        "I think so," replies the nurse.  I'm getting worried.
        The doctor addresses me: "Now that we've got the IV in, the worst of
this is over.  You should be starting to feel the anesthetics now."
        "I think I'm starting to feel someth..." and I started drifting into an
alternate reality.  Just before I finally did pass out I noticed the doctor
taking out a rusty, vintage WWI dental drill.  Then again, I was pretty drugged
up, so it was probably just the work of an overly active imagination.
        I awoke in what seemed like only a few moments. Nothing but smiles
greeted me from both the nurse and the doctor, and I couldn't help thinking
that they were just a little bit too happy about something.  They showed me the
door and mom's limo service delivered me to my bed to get some recuperation.
        However my resting was to be quite short lived, as friend after friend
came pouring into my room.  I felt as if all of my friends were lemmings and my
doorway was the edge of the cliff.  Most would ask me how I feel and wish me
well.  Some of the nicer ones would laugh in my general direction, call me
chipmunk face and tell me to get better, or else.  People actually came over
who I had never met before.  All of them thought that these displays of caring
would lead to a quick recovery, undoubtedly so I could return their favors just
as speedily.  How very wrong they were.
        On the day after the surgery one of my visitors noticed that my left
cheek had ballooned to gargantuan proportions.  Being a testosterone-laden
pain-killer-resisting Mighty-Morphin Power Arnold gave me the flexibility to
reply that it had "swelled a bit."  After he left, a look in the bathroom
mirror made me realize that, in all actuality, my cheek had annexed the
Sudetenland.  My rational side told me that all I needed was a little
rest and everything would be fine in the morning.
        It sure is funny how rationalism goes out the window when you wake up
at 6:30 AM, bleeding and in intense pain. I went over to the bathroom only to
find out that my dad prefers not to use the master bath for his excrementorial
functions, so I waited it out until he finished up and then went inside to
assess my situation.  I wasn't dead yet, and I knew I had to stop the bleeding
so I grabbed a piece of gauze and placed it carefully over the wound in the
lower jaw.  Biting down on this seemingly innocuous bundle of white fibers
highlighted my pain as A1 sauce enhances the flavor of a steak.  I was on a new
level, one that I had never seen before, one that is usually the sole privilege
of mothers delivering babies and maybe a few lucky victims.
        At this point I had a visitor's pass to hell's corporate offices.
Lucky man that I am, the first person I meet is the CEO.  His face was a
picture of innocence, but his voice was quite a different story.  A
bone-jarring conglomeration of Darth Vader, Freddie, and John Denver offered me
two options: "Go it alone and take your chances, or sign this little piece of
paper to give me posthumous property rights to your soul and I'll make sure you
live, this time."  I was desperate and shivering on the bathroom floor, so I
pulled out the gauze and signed with great alacrity.  Just then my parents came
to the door asking if I was okay, and the vision vanished.
        A few minutes later, my second visit to the office found me meeting a
completely different doctor and nurse.  I was pumped with novocain and a
vesiconstrictor, and given a prescription for an antibiotic to treat the
infection.  I couldn't resist asking the question: "What happened to the other
doctor that did my surgery?"
        "Oh, him.  Umm.  He's on vacation in Florida."
        Now it's a couple of days later, and the antibiotics have brought the
swelling down considerably.  I feel pretty good, and I know that it's just a
matter of time before I'm completely healed.  I think now that Satan was just
an apparition, but I'll never be sure until I'm six feet under. Until then let
me offer you a little bit of advice:  If you want a relaxing and cost effective
vacation of oral extraction you should pick up a pair of needlenose pliers, a
self-help book, and some nuclear strength pain killers, and yank the damn
things yourself.