Wednesday 11/1- Medical and dental tourism is a big thing here in Costa Rica because treatment and procedures are far less expensive than in many other parts of the world, and often the doctors or dentists are trained in the US, Canada, or Europe, so the quality of the job being done is just as good. We have used both local medical and dental services and been very satisfied, and it was time for Ramie and me both to have another dental cleaning. Taylor hadn’t been to the dentist in quite a long time either, so since she was here, she would take advantage of the opportunity and get her teeth cleaned as well. We went to the dentist who fixed Ramie’s crown and retainer a few months ago. She works on her own in the office, a single dentist with a single chair and an “assistant” who was more of a receptionist that also helped out with a few other things in the office, but none of the actual procedure. The dentist herself was the one doing the cleaning, unlike in the US where you have a hygienist do most of the work and only see the dentist for 2 minutes at the end. This meant that each of us would have to wait around for the other 2 to have their cleaning done, but that wasn’t so bad, what else were we going to do on a Wednesday afternoon? Ramie went first, took about a half hour, and was done without any issues. I was up next. About a month earlier I noticed that I was having some sensitivity in a particular area and I mentioned this to the dentist at the start. She took one look inside my mouth and saw the problem, one of my old fillings had a crack. She went through the rest of my teeth, one by one, looking at the old fillings and said that there are some other ones that might be compromised as well, but this one with the crack could be a big problem because we don’t know how big the crack is. She stressed that this must be taken care of very soon so it doesn’t get worse, so after she finished with my cleaning, we scheduled another appointment for me in about 10 days to get that cracked tooth taken care of, take x-rays and figure out if any of the other fillings had to be replaced.
Finally, Taylor was up. When she came back out the dentist reported that Taylor had 6 cavities that needed to be filled. Oh boy!! Since dental procedures are so expensive back in the US and she doesn't have insurance, Taylor decided that she wanted to have as many of them fixed down here as she could, and she made an appointment to come back next Monday to knock some of these out for a much lower price tag. Today our cleanings cost $60 US each. When was the last time you had anything done at a dentist for only $60!?
Since we’d be down in Ojochal for our dentist appointments today, we knew we wanted to bring Taylor to Los Gatos restaurant, the treehouse style restaurant that has the best nachos in Costa Rica (at least in my opinion). Geoff and Tracy hadn’t had a chance to meet Taylor yet, so we invited them to meet us at the restaurant too, and the 5 of us hung out for a couple hours and had dinner together. I think everyone had a good time.
PS. Happy 9 year wedding anniversary to us… dental cleanings, how romantic?! hahahah 💜❤💜
Monday 11/6- Hi everyone, Ramie again. A few weeks ago when I was
helping Randall and Lowell with packing that container they asked me if I
would be available again today to help load the actual trucks and
containers that would be shipping all of those pallets. I checked with
Taylor to see if she wanted to do anything or go anywhere before I said
yes, and she gave the go-ahead for me to help them. She didn't have
anything she wanted to do away from the house and Dana would be working,
so I was free.
I arrived there at 7am and started
unloading the “practice” storage container where everything was
currently stored, and placing each pallet in order as it came out.
It
would all have to go back into the new container that exact same way. It
wasn't long before the first truck arrived and pallet by pallet, we
reloaded the new trailer. It took a few hours but we got that truck
finished and back on the road. That's when we got the call that
the 2nd truck was still 3 hours away. That's alright though, Randall had
to make crates for some items that were shipping back to the US for a
different person so I would help him with that task. We each grabbed
some tools and supplies to make 2 crates, then inventory and weigh the
contents so they would be ready for their turn to ship. It looked like
it was going to start to rain so all of those pallets that we pulled out
earlier that couldn’t get wet had to be put back into the warehouse.
At around 1:00 the second truck finally arrived. As we were loading
those pallets, wouldn’t you know it, another semi-truck, this one with
building supplies on it, an empty smaller delivery truck arrived and at
about the same time. It was at this moment that I discovered that since
Randall and Lowell are the one of the few places in the area with a
forklift, they also unload and load for other companies. Here in Uvita
there are places up the mountains that semi-trucks can’t get to, so when
the big trucks come down from San Jose, the supplies have be
transferred onto smaller delivery trucks. Randall asked me to go help
those drivers while he finished up the shipping container pallets. I
jumped on the larger forklift and drove over to where those other 2 tuck
were parked, all the while thinking “Great, I wonder how this
communicating will go.” They speak Spanish and I really don't. They
explained to me in a way that I could understand that I had to move 3
stacks of Plyrock (cement board version of sheetrock) from the big truck
to the small one. The tricky part here was that they were parked along
the main highway and I would have to block part of the lane while
unloading/loading. The parking lot where this would normally happen was
currently occupied by the container we were loading. It took me about a
half hour of maneuvering, but I got the Plyrock moved. I was able to
communicate and discuss what needed to be done with the drivers without
any issues. I guess my Spanish isn't as bad as I thought! Then it was
back to the warehouse to finish loading the other container. It seemed
like it took forever but we finally had everything packed and got the
driver on the road at about 3:15. I had to hurry home, shower and get
Taylor to her Dentist apt, by 4:00!
We arrived with
time to spare at the Dentist and they got Taylor in the chair right at
her appointment time.
Prior to today, Taylor has never needed a cavity
filled and she was nervous about getting the shot of Novocain! I think
it only took about 45 minutes and out she came, and who would have
guessed it, all her teeth fixed. Well almost. One of them was on a
wisdom tooth that will have to be pulled anyway so they decided not to
fill it. Maybe she will have to make another trip here to have those
wisdom teeth done? Today the 5 fillings only cost $282. So, let’s think
about that. A cleaning and 5 fillings cost Taylor $342 and she didn’t
have to make an appointment 6 months in advance to get it done!
Tuesday
11/7- Today is Taylor's last full day with us. Wow, where did the time
go? It seemed like so long ago that she arrived, but the time also
seemed to go so quickly. Since Taylor had her good camera here we asked
her to take our pictures for us for my mom’s annual Christmas card. We
had talked about doing this the entire time Taylor was here but here we
are, we waited until the last day. The weather was beautiful and sunny
so we originally planned to take the pictures outside with our little
piece of the jungle in the background. Here comes mother nature again,
though, ruining our plans! Just as we had all finished getting dressed
and getting the camera ready, it started to rain. I guess we’ll do
them in the porch under the roof! At least we had some good laughs
during the process of taking some silly pics and trying to get Skye to
pose.
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| I don't want to wear this silly hat! |
Once that was done it was time to help Taylor get her stuff packed. That took a little while but once it was done it was time to play a few last rounds of Rummikub. Ramie used to play this game with his grandma when he was little and Taylor had never played it before her visit with us this month. I think we kind of got Taylor hooked on it and she really enjoyed playing so we might as well get in a few more games before dinner. After dinner it was time to play some more Mario Party with some more hysterical laughter, but it couldn’t be a late night since we have to hit the road tomorrow around 7.
Wednesday 11/8-
I think we’ve mentioned it before, but Taylor is by no means an early riser like we are. It was an early morning for her, but it was time to go. We got all of her things in the car, got Skye in the car (we had to drop her off at Ray & Wesley’s to spend the day with Izzy again) and we were ready to hit the road. Or at least we thought we were! What a day to discover that your truck battery was completely dead!! This is NOT good! Ramie took a moment to mention that yesterday when he and Taylor went to the dentist that he thought the battery might be getting weak but didn't give it a second thought and figured he had a week or two to find a replacement. We know that batteries in general do not last very long here, there’s something with the heat and humidity make them die quickly, but we were not prepared for this! It was a new battery when we bought our truck only about 2.5 years ago!
We don't have a charger here, and even if we did get it started, did we really want to run the risk of shutting the truck off and not being able to restart it or having something else happen along the way to the airport? Nope, that is not something we want to deal with! It's too early for any of the stores in town to be open, and even if they were, there really isn’t enough time to go buy one, replace it and hit the road. Ramie quickly made some phone calls and Loren was the first to answer and give us his approval to borrow his truck to make the drive. Ramie jumped in Dusti, headed to Loren’s to trade Dusti for Loren’s truck, and quickly returned home. While he was out trading vehicles, Taylor and I pulled everything out of our truck that would have to be switched to Loren’s so it would be a quick switch-a-roo and we could get on the road. By the time we left home to drop Skye off we were only about 30 minutes behind schedule. Let's hope for no traffic issues along the way! Thankfully the drive went smoothly and we got Taylor to the airport just after 11am, with time to spare, her flight was scheduled to leave at 1:30. Some tears may have been shed, just like always on days like this, and long hugs were given before Taylor headed for the terminal.
On the drive back we made a couple quick stops, bought a battery, picked up Skye, and arrived home just before 4:00. What a long day of driving!
Thursday 11/9- It's a quiet day around the house today, Skye (and we) are already missing Taylor. Skye and Taylor have been besties since day 2 when Skye finally wasn’t scared of Taylor anymore. Today I saw her go into Taylor’ room to look for her several times, unfortunately it will probably take Skye a few days before she realizes that Taylor isn’t here anymore. Today was mostly just a day to get things cleaned up around the house, do all the laundry and take care of some of the chores that may have been neglected. Oh and Ramie also installed that new battery in the truck!
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| She's not in the back yard, where is she? |
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| Nope, not out front either. Where did she go? |
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| I cant find her anywhere, I'm just going to stay here and be sad for a little bit. |
Friday 11/10- This morning I had to work, just like I do every Friday morning, but I had a very good reason to quit early today. This afternoon I had to go back to the dentist to get that cracked tooth fixed.
Thankfully my cracked tooth was not that severe and the dentist was able to grind out the old filling and crack and refill the tooth. During last week’s appointment she said that was a possibility, but it made me nervous because the last time I had to have that done in the US it didn’t work out as planned and I ended up needing a crown (or was that just the US dentist’s scheme for making more money off me?!) The main down side to today’s procedure was that she ended up having to give me 4 shots of Novocain instead of 2 to get the right nerve to get numb. I don’t think she “missed” the spot the first 2 times, I think she just didn’t wait long enough for it to kick in. Needless to say I was feeling quite numb for quite a long time afterwards!
There couldn’t be too much chewing of whatever I ended up trying to eat for dinner tonight! Today’s re-filling came to a grand total of $72.
Oh, and the x-ray machine was broken today so I would have to come back AGAIN in about another week once the machine was up and running again to get the x-rays done. Would these dentist appointments ever end?! I have to imagine Ramie is getting bored of looking at the waiting room!
Wednesday 11/15- Today we were on our way back to the dentist again, although today’s appointment wasn’t originally supposed to be needed. Hopefully this is the last visit for about 6 months until our next cleaning!! It’s a really good thing that these dental appointments aren’t very expensive! The machine was fixed so the dentist called us back in so she could do x-rays. Hopefully she doesn’t find anything concerning enough to need to fix, I’m sick of dental work! As my luck would have it, though, she did find problems. 😞😨 Have I mentioned how much I hate Novocain!? Since I was already here and there was another cracked filling that concerned her, she decided to get it done and over with today. I addition to this one, she found some other problems that she said would have to be fixed eventually, but not today.
Today’s bill came to $135 for the x-rays and filling. In a few days she would send an estimate for the rest of what should be done.
A few days later the bad news came. The list of work that she is recommending were the replacement of my existing crown, which would cost $490, and I had 7 more old silver fillings that should be re-done like these last 2 had been, and they ranged from $65 to $75 each. Fortunately, none of these were emergencies to get done ASAP. I think I am going to take a break from dental work for a little while! At least none of the problems are new cavities! I mean, do I even have any teeth in there that don’t already have some sort of filling? Hahhahaha!
Oh, and one more thing, now that it's been delivered, I can tell you about the project that I've been working on on & off for the last few months since we returned from our last trip to MN. I brought back my crochet supplies and made a lovey for my nephew. One to match his sister's that I made 4 years ago. A Lion for Luca to go with Elodie's Elephant.
Pura Vida!
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