Just got back a while ago from my second root canal...which was really my first.
Dentist: "Oh, look. A new storage place for cotton."
The background: He started this root canal 5+ years ago, I assume because he was replacing a bunch of old fillings at that point and did some preliminary work just to get me out of the chair in a reasonable amount of time. But we never connected on getting the rest of the work done on that tooth, either because he didn't tell me to make a follow-up appointment or because I just plumb forgot to do so -- neither of us is certain. In the meantime, he did another root canal on me a couple of years ago.
So when I got my teeth cleaned earlier this month, he said, "We really need to finish that up." So we did. He popped that temporary crown right off, fished out the cotton packing, and started drilling. 90 minutes later I'm all set except for the permanent crown, which I get on the 30th.
The worst part was the novocaine shot he gave me in the roof of my mouth. Remind me NEVER to need another upper tooth root canal. But the rest was pretty much painless. It is absolutely weird to start hearing the drill via bone conduction, though, as he gets closer and closer to the end of the root...
