Pamper Monday – Bite me!

Copenhagen, Monday morning, 8am. I’ve just delivered the kids to school and I’m unlocking my bike and putting on my cycle helmet. I’m already saying to myself ‘in an hour it’ll all be over and done with’. The ‘it’ in question being my dentist appointment. If you don’t know what the word ‘dentist’ does to me, go read my post Fangs for the Memory 😉

But as it’s ‘pamper Monday’ here on the blog – the day where I focus on little ways to pamper myself (a keystone of the Flylady system) – this presents an ideal opportunity for me to do something nice! 🙂 My dentist appointment is at 8.30am, so it’s just a tad too early to partake of the beer in my dentist’s waiting room. Yes. Beer. Did you read Fangs for the Memory or not? It’s all explained there…

The appointment goes well. I’m finally (fingers crossed) rid of that darned infected root that caused so much heartache and tears…not to mention neverending dentist bills for root canal work, an operation on my jaw and, when that failed, removal of said darned tooth/root and, finally, its replacement with a bridge. I had the bridge put in back in January and it’s doing very nicely, thank you very much. So today I’m let off with a couple of x-rays and a general clean-up. And no fillings, Mum! ðŸ™‚

So what can I do for a little treat afterwards? My only other options at 9am in the morning are the bakers, the supermarket, the newsagent or the bagel shop. I never made it past the bakers….

A lovely høj chokolade snejl (‘high chocolate snail’, which is a big cinammon roll with chocolate on top). The dentist probably wouldn’t approve. Bite me! (said the ‘snail’) And let me tell you – it was terribly good with a warm cup of chai…

Hope you have a marvelous Monday! 🙂

Wonderful Wednesday

All in all it’s been a wonderful Wednesday. Not because I followed up my (dreaded) visit to the dentist (he of ‘beer in the waitingroom’ fame – see my Fangs for the Memory post) with a (free) facial from Origins. Though ‘free’ isn’t probably the right word…the hour one session (which included facial massage, peeling, scrub, masque, tonic, serum, lotion, ‘Peace of Mind’ massage, light makeup etc, etc) was ‘free’ if you bought a couple of products. But I digress! 🙂

No, it’s because I caught a tiny glimpse of something this afternoon. We came back from school, ladened with backpacks, a sledge, ‘things’ DD7 has created etc and I decided to do an extra bit of shovelling. I’d shovelled and swept snow this morning at 7.30 am before we left for school, but I decided to do a little bit more. Just for the record, sweeping snow is a great workout. I wasn’t wearing my heart rate monitor today (used it while doing ‘snow’ intervals last year) but I could feel that I was quickly up to max pulse. Curling must be a great cardio sport. But I digress again! 😉

Anyways…I was sweeping the snow and I suddenly heard a little dickie bird. And I realised that it was 4.15pm and it was still light. Gadzooks! Spring is on the way!

So I filled up the bird feeder to the brim and enjoyed a couple of minutes of just looking around the garden. (Gosh, I’m getting terribly sentimental in my old age, aren’t I?!) Spring is my absolute favourite season (and my seasonal colours…) so this afternoon I am just ‘full of the joys’.

Hope you, too, are having a wonderful Wednesday! 🙂

Fangs for the memory

Today I went to the dentist. Dentists and I go a long way back. Though I could certainly see them far enough. (Insert a big ‘ho ho’ here.)

Starting with the school dentist, where Mum claims I had a gold sticker at the top of my appointment card to show that I was a ‘special’ customer (read “terrified”). I still shudder at the thought of walking down that little alley at the bottom of Leith Links in Edinburgh. Not off to a good start.

When I grew up and got a job in my 20s, I was able to choose my own dentist. (General healthcare is free in the UK, but you pay for dentistry from the age of 18). I worked my way through several but finally found one which was close to my office near Broughton Street. The main attraction was being able to pay for (I kid you not) laughing gas. If I remember rightly, it cost £15 for a session – cheap at half the price! Certainly beat having to have an injection and was much more fun. Also taught me that Nancy Regan was right when she said “Just say no to drugs” – I reeeeeally enjoyed those sessions and did NOT want to come back to reality. There was only one side-effect, and that was that the gas took a while to wear off again. So I must have looked like an utter loony, grinning inanely at strangers on Leith Walk on the way back to the office.

Moved to work at the European Court in Luxembourg and the hunt was on yet again for a good dentist and doctor.

My first doctor there was called Dr Goerts (a Luxemburger). His receptionist spoke with a guttural ‘g’ which meant that she answered with phone with a “Hello, Dr Hurts” to which I, with my childish sense of humour, longed to reply “I do hope he won’t”. But I didn’t. (And I suppose I should add, he didn’t either.)

It was in Luxembourg that I found my best ever dentist. He was the dentist of my boss (the British Judge) and was a Dane by the name of Hans Ã…gerup. His (very sweet) wife helped him and the reception area had a large collection of Danish magazines and children’s books. I actually used to turn up early for my appointments because I saw it as an opportunity to use what little Danish I had learned by then, and do some reading practice. 🙂 (I was, as you will no doubt have guessed, dating my Danish DH by this point.)

Hans Ã…gerup was very patient, quietly spoken, extremely professional and explained EVERYTHING he was doing. I was completely at ease and didn’t have to resort to my usual calming trick of looking up the dentist’s nose… 😉

Got married, moved to Copenhagen and the hunt was on again. I saw an article in “Politikken” (Danish broadsheet) about dentists who had alternative methods when dealing with nervous patients. One in particular caught my eye. Jens Bjerregaard (and his better half, who also sits in reception) of Hellerup, who has draught beer in his waiting room.


In fact, not just one but several. You can just help yourself, there are proper glasses and beermats on the counter beside the beer taps. A band even comes and plays when the Christmas beer arrives. He claims it calms the patients and smells better on their breath than coffee. Who am I to argue?

I’ve been a patient there for 3 or 4 years now, but don’t normally partake of the free booze. Mostly because I’m always there first thing in the morning (apparently it’s quite busy in the afternoons). Though last December I did have a small glass of Tuborg Classic (an ale). It was just after a lengthy operation (not to mention an anæsthetic that would knock out a horse) on my lower jaw and Mrs Bjerregaard even kindly provided a straw. Now that’s what I call a good dentist.