My wife got me a new toothbrush last night. She does this pretty frequently, so it isn't like I've been hanging on to my childhood brush, still, last night was a bit different. Normally she gets me these standard shaped brushes with the diamond shaped head and the angled neck, and with straight, uniform bristles. But this morning I had to brush my teeth with one of these new brushes where the bristles point in every direction, and some are shorter than others, and some are fatter "to massage the gums." And I started to think that this brush, which probably cost several tens of thousands of dollars to develope, and cost me about twice or more what a standard brush would cost, is all the fault of you lazy ass people, and will probably not work on me.
I don't have the healthiest mouth in the world, but neither are my teeth falling out. I'd say I'm probably the average mouth a dentist sees. I grew up being told by dentists and dental hygienists that the best way to brush your teeth was to brush up and down on the tooth, not side to side. They said that when you brush side to side the bristles cannot get down into the crevaces of the teeth and plaque can build up there. They said this is the most common problem people have with their teeth because they will not learn to brush right. The only way to prevent that from happening is to brush up and down. So I, being the duteous person that I am, made a habit to brush up and down. It takes me a bit longer to brush my teeth than the average person I guess, but my teeth feel clean and dentists tell me I'm a good brusher. Or at least I was.
Now they have these new fangled brushes, and yes, I know they are not all that knew. The first of these brush innovation I noticed was about ten to fifteen years ago when they angled the neck to fit in your mouth better. Then they ridged the bristles to get between the teeth better, and then they angled them, and then they made some fatter to massage... And it's really gotten so out of hand that I'm not sure how to use the brush. I mean all of this is really just because you people are too lazy to brush up and down. They make these new designs to compensate for side to side brushers; so that when you brush side to side, the wrong way, the bristles get that extra plaque. They even have electric tooth brushes for people who are too damn lazy to even move their hands. Just stick the brush in your mouth, turn the brush on, wait for ten seconds and pull the brush out. Don't wait too long or the brush will desintigrate your teeth. But it is all because people don't brush up and down, like their dentists always tell them too!
Please don't get me wrong. I love technology and innovation; anything that can make a task easier, or shorter; or anything that can make it cheaper or better. Hell, I'd be happy if they could find a way that we didn't have to brush at all (short of getting dentures). So I don't mind these new brushes, I'm just confused. Do I need to brush up and down, like I've always been told? Or should I brush side to side like the lazy masses? Because I look at this brush, the way the bristles are angled, and I think of the commercial where it shows the brush moving side to side and wiping away plaque like it was magic, and I wonder: Do these brushes even work if you brush correctly?
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4 comments:
My dentist never told me to brush up and down down that I can remember. But he always bugs me to floss. I don't floss. There is a sign (I know I'm lame) in my bathroom reminding me to floss, yet I still don't. My dentist says that 35% of people over 30 have early gingivitus (I'm not that far from 30) because they don't floss. I thought that new floss on a stick thing would be great for me. But my hygenist says that using that is no good because it just transplants bacteria from in between these two teeth to those two teeth instead of removing it like real floss does.
I have no idea why I just shared that with you, but it seemed relevant.
That's great! Share all you want. Who cares about what is relevant and what isn't?
But really, I'm astounded that you have never heard to brush up and down. Did I imagine this? I thought it was the next most important thing to: Always floss.
Of course everyone knows they should floss. I don't, but I know I should. Still, I thought the brushing up and down thing was like a Dentist Mantra. Maybe I'm wrong after all these years.
My childhood dentist had this ratty and faded sign that said, "Only Floss the Ones You Want to Keep!"
So this has spiraled into an out of control joke between my siblings and I. We all have these lame-ass crafty super cute signs with that saying in our bathrooms (in our own homes, we don't live together). We end completely unrelated conversations saying, "have a goood night and always remember to just floss the ones you want to keep."
And then I found ten dollars.
That's another thing we do...when we are telling stories that we thought might be funny or interesting, but by the end we realize they aren't...so we end it with "and then I found ten dollars/"
Enjoy!
I'm trying to read your weblog from beginning to current day. this is as far as I am.
Can't wait to see how this letter campaign pans out!
Ha! Yes, I've often found that when a story goes awry it is good to end it with, "And there was a severed hand on the ground."
Your way is better, though, because when you say you found ten dollars no one asks what you did with it. You put it in your pocket, of course. If you tell people you crammed the severed hand in your pocket for a rainy day they'd probably stop talking to you.
Don't expect too much from those campaigns. I'm sad to say that I have a bad habit of starting things but
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