Chicken Bones and Broken Tooth

Last Saturday, after the car was safely in the hands of the nice folks at Midas, we decided to go to lunch. Since our day had taken a crappy turn, we decided to treat ourselves and head to PF Chang's. I had the yummy honey chicken. It is a breaded boneless chicken. We were very hungry. When my food arrived, I jumped in and started devouring it. It was the lunch portion and I made fairly quick work of it. When I was on my very last piece, danger struck. I bit down and something felt hard. I thought at first it was a piece of uncooked rice or one of the crispy rice noodles that garnished the meal. When it was clear that there was no biting through whatever it was, I tried to spit it out. Luckily I am not too lady-like, so spitting out my food is not something I mind doing. It took three good attempts to get the offending piece of matter out of my mouth. I am sure that was a pretty scene. I showed it to Prince E and he cleaned it off and said he was fairly sure it was a chicken bone. I looked at it again and agreed. Just then the assistant manager came by to see how the meal had been. Prince E told her that the food was great, but that I nearly broke a tooth on a chicken bone. She apologized profusely and took the bone (there goes my lawsuit) to show the manager. He came over immediately trying to determine how angry we were, if I was injured, and how big of a raucous we were going to make. I think he was happy to find that we weren't that pissed off. The situation would have been different if I had broken a tooth or nearly choked on the thing. When the waiter brought the bill a few minutes later, we saw that my lunch had been comped. Pretty great since I had eaten the whole thing.

I went to the dentist today and it turns out I DO have a broken tooth. It predates the chicken bone, though, so I won't be suing PF Chang's anytime soon. (When I made the appointment last week, I already new I had something wrong with that tooth. I mistakenly thought it was something simple like a cavity). Here is a photo of the tooth. WARNING: it is gross. That is why I linked to it on another page. As you can see, my filing leaked and seeped into the tooth, causing part of it to decay or something. I will be getting a crown next week.

UPDATE: An inquiring reader, Amy, asked how I got such a good photo of the tooth. I forgot that part of the story. To show me what the broken tooth looked like, the dentist took several photos of the tooth with a fancy camera and printed them out to show me. When I was checking out, the receptionist made a joke that the pictures would be great on the fridge. I asked if I could have one. He thought I was kidding. I, of course, was not. He went and asked the dentist and she let me take one of the photos. I was planning the whole time to put in on the blog. That is just how my mind works. Also, they called to reschedule today, so the crown appointment won't be for a few weeks, if you are keeping track at home.