August 2: Erde, D90

Erde's doctor called me this morning to see how Erde was doing.  I reported that she is doing fine, still not herself, but doing better than I expected after a major surgery.  I asked her whether the thinning of the bone around the tooth associated with the mass (tumor) can only be caused by a tumor, and she told me that it can often be caused by a large tartar buildup, too, and Erde  had a large amount of tartar under her gum. (Again, so much for holistic teeth-cleaning in the future.)  So that's good news, or potentially good news. And perhaps the mass itself was triggered by something related. And perhaps the mass on the inside of Erde's mouth was where it started and it spread to the outside of the gum and not the reverse.  I can speculate till the moon turns blue, but I think it best that I just concentrate on learning the language I will need to have next Friday or so when I get the biopsy report, just in case the tumor is malignant.

I did stop down to the Land Rover service shop today to ask them if what I was hearing was a potential problem.  I told them I probably have been hearing this for a while, but ignored it because each day I just heard an imperceptible difference from the day before.  I really heard it after I picked up by D90 on Thursday after having a loaner vehicle for seven days which was quiet as a church mouse.  Usually I hear at least five distinct sounds, blended together as well as the 110 musical instruments used in the Met's production of Wagner's Gotterdamerung.  Those five   are:  the big All-Terrain tires pounding the pavement, the sound of the clutch slamming the gears together, the usual creaks accompanying a 20-year old vehicle, the unmuffled hum of the engine and the roar of the blowers on either the heater or the AC. But this new sound I started to hear weeks ago would remind any resident of Prague on the night of August 20, 1968, of the strident sound of the Russian tanks grinding  their tank treads into the old cobblestone streets of  Wencelas Sqaure. It was the equivalent of someone randomly playing  one of those obnoxious vuvuzelas that offended our ears during the 2009 World Cup playoffs in South Africa at a Met opera.  As it turns out, Chris, the guy who works on my D90 there, quickly diagnosed the sound as a problem.  Apparently the two universal joints that connect  the drive shaft to the transfer box and the rear differential after 20 years were becoming worn down to the point where they would eventually break.  Not a good thing to have happen 6000 miles from home, although the potential for something like this happening is one of the very  reasons I take the entire 1500 pages of the D90 parts and workshop manuals with me on this trip, in paper, on CD, and on my iPad. Two hours of labor and about $180 in parts will solve this problem for me next Wednesday. Here's a photo of the rear Universal Joint for the D90 in case you wondering what it looks like.  It helps keep all four independent wheels working independently.