Days Without Alcohol - 53
I was at the dentist today having my teeth cleaned by a hygienist. I felt a bit insulted when I had gone in a couple of weeks ago and told I needed to make an appointment with the hygienist, because it sort of implies that my mouth is not a hygienic place. Which it isn't. But I don't need to be told that.
In the past the dentist himself has done that horrible scratchy, whiney drill thing, which blasts off the encrusted plaque and jangles your nerve endings, but clearly now they have separated this into an appointment with a hygienist, who charges 50 quid a throw for putting you through discomfort and occasional jarring pain. I just wish she was called something other than hygienist. Like "Tooth Enhancer" or "Expert Brusher" or just anything that doesn't imply I suffer from the worst halitosis known to man.
Anyway in order to justify her position and her astronomical fee (though for a man who often gets over a hundred quid for twenty minutes work, I can't really complain) the Hygienist - (Tooth Fairy would be better) doesn't just use that horrendous plaque dislodger that buzzes like a demented mosquito flying through a cloud of helium. That's just the first part of the session. A part that seems to last for days as she works her way across the back of the bottom teeth, whilst you wait for her to hit one of your nerves or cut into your gums, then across the front of your bottom teeth, pausing to really dig into a patch of especially persistent grime. Then the same at the top, back and front. All the time you've got one of those strange little sucking hooks in the side of your mouth, extracting excess saliva and bits of gunk and sending them shooting down a tube into... what? I started wondering where all the spit and chipped off plaque actually goes. Perhaps it is discharged over the head of a mouse in some rodent version of Noel's House Party. I hope so. I don't like to think of my sputum going to waste. As long as some mice are entertained it is not a useless effort by my saliva glands.
Some drool of course still goes down your face as you wince in pain at this mini (and ineffectual) torture. It's a good job I am not a spy. I would crack in seconds.
I got some extra procedures after this though. My teeth were then blasted by some implement which shot lemony or minty (I couldn't quite tell what the taste was) liquid on to them, which had tiny little particles in it. I was being sand blasted. When the concoction hit my tongue it tasted pleasant, but fizzled like space dust. I wondered if that was what it was. It seemed unlikely. This continued for a while, whilst the hygienist (why not "Oral Freshener") picked at my teeth occasionally with the more regular non vibrating picking tool that was all the dentists had in the old days, before they got into this odd array of vibrators which shoot unguents on to your tongue. Then alas the helium mosquito came out again to punish me some more, before the teeth were polished with some other buzzing utensil, with some kind of industrial tooth paste on it, which felt like it was filling in all the gaps in my teeth, like minty Polyfilla. This was like a carwash for the mouth, and we'd paid for every service.
I was disappointed that there wasn't some kind of swirly machine which would administer the little pink mouthwash that you get at the end, but that is still in a plastic cup and you are expected to spit into the sink yourself. How long before they invent some clip-on machine which will swill your mouth for you, before shooting itself into a plug hole (which will send the liquid flying into the face of an unsuspecting and innocent guinea-pig on the rodent version of "Balls of Steel")?
I don't know how long the whole thing took, not much more than 20 minutes (so I am still worth double what the hygienist is worth - though she can do probably 24 of these procedures in a working day, whereas I would be unable to gig more than three times a night, so she's still winning). Still, I think I would rather be a comedian than have to dig around in the gaps between the dirty teeth of unhygienic strangers. And also my job title is way better. Who'd want to be friends with a hygienist? She'd be less fun than a teetotal comedian and twice as judgemental about your personal freshness.
Personally I prefer my women to be unhygienic. They are much more fun.
Still my teeth are probably now the cleanest they have ever been since they erupted through my gums. Come smell my breath. It's like minty space dust.
