Comments on: you’ll never brush your teeth lightly again

By: Alex

Alex — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 22:22:58 +0000

I know this is an older post by you, but, wow…that article(s) amazed me. TY for putting that out there.
Now I know why I paid for that tooth implant…I was worth it.

By: Feminista

Feminista — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 06:24:13 +0000

#41 Zeugma: How right you are.When my late husband was lax with his share of the housework,that’s one of the lines I quoted. My understanding is that Che said that to l@s gueriller@s when they were in the Sierra Madre Mts.in the late 50s. As the resident MD,he knew what he was talking about.

Another line I used was from Chairman Mao: “Where the broom does not go,the dust does not vanish of itself.”

Usually these reminders worked.

Anyone who works in education,social services,health care,etc. is exposed to many viruses and other airborne infections. Frequent handwashing is the #1 recommended prevention method. So yes,I carry hand sanitizer with me and use it frequently,and I get an annual flu shot.

By: Zeugma

Zeugma — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 05:40:36 +0000

@Ian (#13) and HOH (#19)

Che said that cleanliness is a bourgeois obsession, but correct hygiene is a revolutionary necessity.

By: Jain

Jain — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 03:18:58 +0000

Long Island girls? Levittown 1951-1953 here, followed by West Islip to 1967, Mom and sister still there.

By: Kat

Kat — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 13:51:07 +0000

I agree with Alison completely (and I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks so) that teeth are kind of strange because it totally is a little bit of your skeleton sticking out!

MC, I found the plaster cast of my mom’s teeth in a drawer one time when I was a kid. It scared the crap out of me, and I don’t think I opened that drawer willingly for a decade afterward!

By: Lizzy

Lizzy — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 12:49:56 +0000

Oh my…after reading that sob story I wish I’d worn my retainer more often.

By: Ellen Orleans

Ellen Orleans — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 03:19:13 +0000

My dentist’s office is more like a day spa. When you walk in, the staff offers you bottled water or tea. Before you have work done, you can have a warm wax dip for your hands. Very soothing. If you have an appointment in the morning, you can have your feet massaged while your teeth are examined. If you like, you can have earphones with your choice of a Pandora station.

The staff are 95% women.

I no longer dread the dentist, but I still don’t floss as much as I should.

By: hairball_of_hope

hairball_of_hope — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 03:10:14 +0000

@Andrew B (#35)

“…my own metatarsals inserted just above my mandible…”

Both metatarsals at once? I usually lower my mandible only to change metatarsals.

By: Andrew B

Andrew B — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 02:52:48 +0000

Hm, that’s a much closer look at Alison’s big glistening choppers than I really needed to take. The bluish lighting from the Mac Book screen adds an extra touch of weirdness. Based on Alison’s “seeing the skeleton” comment, I take it she was trying to be a little spooky. After the last post’s picture and this one, I’m expecting the next post to carry a picture of Alison in Heath Ledger-as-Joker face paint.

Kate L, 10, obviously you aren’t relying on Stephen King to provide an objective depiction of New England, but you’re basically right: he does use real features of the region effectively in his stories. The claustrophobic feeling one can get from the forests, hills, and valleys; the darkness of old abandoned mill buildings; the family burying grounds that are scattered all around. They’re all real, and they can be spooky.

GJ, hope all your scans go well, your metatarsals haven’t switched places with your mandible or anything. (I frequently find my own metatarsals inserted just above my mandible, but that’s something different.) And it’s a good thing you told us you were having cognitive deficits. Nobody was going to figure it out, that’s for sure.

By: hairball_of_hope

hairball_of_hope — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 02:23:00 +0000

@R2A (#33)

I’m a North Shore kid from Queens. I’m guessing you were from South Shore Nassau because of the fluoride tabs. If my memory serves me correctly, the towns of Hempstead, Rockville Center, etc. had these big water towers drawn from the aquifer, and the water supply was not fluoridated until long after the North Shore communities. There was no public sewer system on the South Shore until the mid-late 1970s, everyone on the South Shore had septic tanks.

I’m also guessing you’re not quite 50 yet, so you would have moved to CT in the mid-1960s, in the middle of a very long drought in NY, during which the South Shore water table dropped precariously low.

Taking another guess, I’ll say your family might have been part of the mass exodus of folks out of Roosevelt during the blockbusting era of the 1960s.

How am I doing in the guessing department?

As for the knowledge, that’s the Useless Information Department. Also, I’m old enough to have some dental tetracycline staining. .