A crown? Can't I just have a tiara instead?

The look of absolute terror in this woman's eyes is something I can relate to as I've just spent 80 minutes in a dentist's chair as he prepared one of my lower molars for a crown. I was placidly minding my own business a week or so ago when the gentle probing of my tongue loosened part of a tooth that fell away from a rather large filling. Once Maurice my new Lismore dentist rubbed the dollar signs from out of his eyes, he recommended a crown as the best solution. So this morning I presented myself for the first stage of the procedure which seemed to involve sliding an 8 inch needle into my cheek a couple of times, filling my mouth with half a dozen (very dry) cotton tubes, followed by cold goo to make some impressions. He certainly made an impression on me! Oh and there was also drilling, gouging, scraping, prodding, and sucking that went on, too. He whispered, with some glee, quite early on in the procedure, that he'd found a "hole that would need filling - now", so I was in the chair a little longer than I had expected.
I go back next week for the crown itself to be fitted and for me to hand over half my super annuation.