29-Years-Old and Still Drooling

Dentists are pure evil.

On Monday I (Ben) had to go in to their lair of wickedness to have four (4!) cavities filled.

Stop there.

Let me be clear on something first: I was 23-years-old (or older) when I got my first cavity. That means I survived a 2-year mission in the Philippines without a problem. And let's be real, that place can be nasty. Especially for a missionary living like the locals (albeit a little bit more well-off). The food, the water (the filthy, nasty waters), and everything else there just lives to rot your teeth. And I got out scot-free.

And then, two years after I got home, I had one (count 'em, one!) cavity. After that, nothing! Not until now, at least.

Which brings us back to the topic at hand: Evil dentists.

So I had four cavities: three on the left side (top and bottom) and one on my bottom right. The dentist numbed the bottom right and top left portions of my face. He didn't numb the bottom left because, according to him, "It's pretty small so we'll see if we can do it without numbing it." Apparently he didn't want to freeze my entire face. What a nice guy. But my favorite bit was when he said, "Let me know if it hurts."

And then he proceeded to drill into my un-numbed tooth.

I just lay there, bracing for that moment when the drill would shoot through the tooth and into my jaw. Fortunately that never happened, but I did flinch a number of times because, well, it did hurt.

"Does that hurt?" the dentist would ask.

"Mhafegm," I would respond (keep in mind, half my face was numb, and my mouth was propped open with some new-fangled, sci-fi jaw propper-opener thingy).

He gave his condolences, said he was almost done, and to let him know if it kept hurting.

"Mghshjksbm."

So again he began excavating my tooth and again I began flinching (but not saying anything, because I'm a tough rugby player who eats pain for breakfast. Or is it my middle name? I can never remember). Anyway, to make a short story long (too late for that, I'm afraid), he stopped, realized the hole was bigger than he first thought (n00b), and decided to numb that part of my face after all.

So there I was, 3/4 of my face numb, drool quite possible leaking out of my gaping maw, unable to recognize the steady flow of drool because my face was so numbed up. Fortunately though the rest of the procedure went as planned and I was quickly shuffled out of the operating room and into the front to pay.

I think people at the dentist office have a sick sense of humor. They love talking to you when it's blatantly obvious that you cannot answer back with even a single clear syllable.

"How would you like to pay for that?"

"Chfjoke."

"I'll assume you said your soul. Have a nice day!"

But yeah, I paid and got the heck out of there. The numbness lasted at least four hours, during which time I had dinner (or rather, dinner had me. I could not for the life of me find my mouth to insert food), gave the FHE lesson (which who knows if Jill understood a word of it), and biked across town to tour a pioneer museum. Right when I thought my face would be frozen that way forever (just like Mom used to threaten me with if I ever made rude faces), the numbness melted away. I'm saved!

The moral of this story, folks, is this: Don't get cavities. And if you do, don't tell anyone.

Dumpster Diving

Do you know what newly weds do when they're bored?

Dumpster dive.

Ok we weren't bored but we really did go for a swim in the deep blue trash bin. It all started with a mail in rebate card we got from the wedding. I was filling out the rebate receipt to get $30 bucks (that's a lot of money for a young couple) when we realized we needed the UPC off the box. Then it dawned on us that we through the box out the day before.

So being as poor as we are we ran down to the dumpster praying that the box would be just on top. We poked our heads over the edge and saw a few boxes of ours and figured it must be close to the top. So Ben, being the nice husband that he is, jumped right in that smelly thing and started to dig.

We didn't really think before we went down to the dumpster but it was 2:00 in the afternoon on a summer day in Utah, and before you knew it Ben was sweating like crazy. I mean he sweats in our apartment with the AC on, so just imagine him in a big metal box digging through trash in the middle of summer. Wow, what a guy. I watched helplessly from the side as giant beads of sweat rolled from his forehead, to nose, and onto a bag of trash.

He went at it for 45 minutes and STILL didn't find it. He literally moved every piece of trash in that dumpster and it wasn't there! We are convinced that someone stole it because everyone needs a Kitchen Aid box just for fun. Even though we didn't find the box I still sent in the mail-in-rebate with a note explaining that we had thrown away the UPC and even went dumpster diving to find it. Maybe the Kitchen Aid company will have compassion on us. :)

But we didn't let this ruin our new toy. Oh no! We enjoyed a nice batch of cookies instead. I also came to realize from this experience how hard working my husband is. What a catch! The good life we have goes on in the Kocher family. :)

The Honeymoon's Over

So we decided to keep a blog so that y'all can keep up with our comings and goings and whatnots. So this is it, the life of the newly weds (barf).

First of all, thanks to all you wonderful people who helped us get hitched (it took some doing) and making our honeymoon a reality.

To start off our über cute blog, here's our honeymoon!

The first day consisted of driving. Not much to tell there. Except we nearly got run off the road by the He**'s Angels biker gang. Don't believe us? Here's proof!

It's a Hell's Angel

What, you can't tell? Here, try this one...

Any better?

You still can't see the back of their jackets? Well, you're just going to have to trust us on this.

By the time we got through all the dadgummed traffic jams and whatnot, it was fairly late when we got to Palm Springs. So of course we ate out. Jill was so excited!

While we were at the super posh resort (really though, talk about feeling out of place. No, sorry, we're not owners. Oh, and what's that? We can't get a $75 gift card because we make less than 50 grand a year? Yup, let's just not fit in), we swam and got sunburned and stuff. And we were that awkward newly wed couple playing Small World (board game) by the swimming pool. We're so stinkin' cute, huh? Oh, and the pool people decided to have a little party with lots o' music. They blasted Cotten Eye Joe and, since nobody else was getting their dance on, we decided to show them all how it's done.

So basically it was us, two pasty white (or sunburned to a crisp) kids jumping around in front of, well, everyone else. And some lady videod us with her phone. Bonus points if you can find her video on YouTube. And since there was nothing else to do at the pool, all eyes were on us. We got a nice loud round of applause following our performance. You can get our autographs later.

We also spent a good long day at San Diego. First we went to the San Diego temple to do sealings. The temple was gorgeous (see below, but try to focus on the building, not the cute couple).

Wow, what a cute couple!

It was there, outside of the temple, that we met our new friends. We never really learned their names, but they are most certainly our best friends in San Diego. They were a family visiting from Utah. They asked us to take their picture. They took ours in return (see above). They asked if we were on vacation or what the heck we were doing there, and before we even told them, they guessed we were on our honeymoon. Good for them. They should try their luck at Family Feud.

Then we went to the Mormon Battalion historic site and got a fun tour!

That's us in/on a covered wagon. So pioneer of us!

We won't bore you with the details (although it was fascinating), but let it be known that, while watching the documentary before the tour, our new friends from the temple came in! So we went through the tour with them. The father said that they were just going to spend the rest of our honeymoon with us. Hey, why not. The more the merrier, right?

Following the tour we wandered the ol' fashioned streets nearby. We went into a 5-and-Dime store to avoid our new friends (because the more is apparently not the merrier), and then after a while of hiding out, proceeded to wander the streets. In no time at all, we had caught up with our friends at a corner. They were eating tortillas. They offered to buy us some, as a treat. Being the mooches we are, we took them up on their offer, stayed a while, ate, and chatted. Now we really are best friends.

But enough about them. You just want to hear about the beach, don't you? Of course you do.

Enter BEACH.

We got rocked around by the waves, got sand everywhere, and got another sunburn (on top of the other sunburns we already had).

Not much else to say about the beach, but look at these pretty pictures and be jealous.

Oh gosh put some clothes on...

Nothing beats sand. Except lightning. Lightning beats sand.

Just be grateful it didn't poop on us

Wet water (as opposed to the dry kind)

And then there was the pier. Holy wow was it nice. Yowzah. I mean, just look for yourself!

USS Midway, in all her majesty

Sail boats!

The breeze, the salt water smell, the everything was just...yup. Words can't describe.

On our last night there we took the Palm Springs Tram up the mountainside, up and away from civilization. It was beautiful. A whole lot of rocks and trees and nature.

And us.

We hiked around a bit before coming back to the top where we got dropped off to eat at their nice, fancy restaurant. The view looked out over, well, everything. We didn't get pictures because we were too busy mooning over each other and being that cute newly wed couple (barf).

And then we drove home.

Anyway, like we said, this is just a way for us to keep you that care (hi Mom[s]!) up to date on what's happening with us. And since our honeymoon happened, well, you get to hear (read?) about it. Love you all and have a very merry Christmas.

Cheers.