Picking my teeth with a sharp steel instrument makes me hot

Every six months, rain or shine, I'm in the dentist's chair having my teeth cleaned. Preventive dentistry, they call it. I have my own ideas.

While it may seem nice to have an attractive woman put her fingers in my mouth, the drama is lost on me when she breaks out the space suit. A face shield, that paper mouth guard and rubber gloves. It makes me wonder what what it says about me in my file.

I had two X-rays on Wednesday. It is considerate of them to give me that lead body apron to wear, but I can't help but wonder about the logic of covering my chest and arms while my entire head is being blasted. Shouldn't they cover my head too? My brain is in there - I think. That might be more important than covering my shoulders, but I'm not a dentist, so I don't know.

I didn't check, but I'm pretty sure that apron didn't cover my junk, either. Is that why is my urine is blue?

There's an idea for some enterprising entrepreneur with time and materials. The Dental X-Ray Helmet. Market it for kids, and the parents will insist that their precious little brats have their delicate heads covered and shielded from the 0.00001 rems of radiation that may be absorbed into their still-forming kid brain. Although most of them could probably benefit from a little Röntgen ray blast. Behave, or I'm turning up the voltage.

I'm old enough to remember the good old days when my dentist went in my mouth bare-knuckled and bare-faced. He used to spit a little when he talked, so maybe the face shield would have been a good idea for him.

That was when the dentist used to do everything. Now, they all have hygienists who handle the teeth cleaning, and according to this, almost 98% of dental hygienists are women. That's interesting, I think. One would figure that the numbers wouldn't be so lopsided once word got out that Hygienist School was a great place to meet girls.

I wonder if they wear that protective stuff when they go on dates?

There's a TV in my dentist's examining room, and they asked me if I wanted it turned on. Sure, as long as you're picking at my teeth with a steel spike, why not tune into Regis and Kelly to complete the torture? Maybe that's the point? The theory is that patients won't complain about scraping their teeth and picking at their gums if there is a suitable distraction that makes the picking seem mild by comparison. Wednesday's guests were Paula Abdul and Jimmy Fallon.

Pick away, sweetheart, I can't feel a thing.