Teeth

For the last 20 years I have struggled to brush my teeth twice a day. At some point I decided the toothpaste taste made me hungry. I thought I’d be able to stave off morning tea until 11 if I didn’t brush my teeth in the morning. I never verified that scientifically, but it was enough to get me out of the morning brushing habit.

My wife, granddaughter of a dentist, also does not brush in the morning and so we never got the boys doing it as a morning routine. A really good brush at night, but nothing in the morning. Wellllll - you are only going to food up your teeth all over again in a few hours aren’t you? Please don't report us.

After a few terse conversations with my modern-day dentist, I vowed to start brushing in the morning again, and cut back on my work-from-home morning-tea and afternoon-tea staple of honey sandwiches. I bought an electric toothbrush, as they are meant to do a better job, and I thought it might be fun.

I loathe my electric toothbrush. Every night I consider just going to be bed unbrushed, as the idea of a hard piece of plastic rattling against my teeth is just so unappealing. I know if you do it right that won't happen, but I am a bit clumsy and so I get that regularly.

Dentists now won't hear of any kind of toothbrush except soft. Soft, softer, softest, extra-softest. Whereas I remember a time when it was OK to have a good, firm toothbrush – in fact it was manly. I prided myself on giving my teeth a pretty damn serious working over with a brush - not a floppy floopy soft thing but a brush.

I have a throwback toothbrush that we picked up at a hotel I think. It is a firm no-nonsense unit that is quite prepared to make your gums bleed, and expects to be thanked for it. And I love it. So - my new approach is that I am going to bribe myself to brush in the morning by making that my morning brush, while I give the enamel a gentle caress in the evening with the electric.

Stay tuned, next week as I'll be discussing flossing and how to successfully lie to your dentist about it.

We're in trouble - get me Churchill's teeth!

A set of Winston Churchill's false teeth have just been sold for £15,200. Says Jane Hughes, head of learning at the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons in London: "These are the teeth that saved the world."

NOTE: Teeth above not actually Churchill's. In fact these are Stalin's.

Toothaches One and Two

I've had this dreadful cold, or acute viral rhinopharyngitis as I like to call it. After about four days of it I was starting to get pain in my top left molar. [I had some work done on that tooth in September and they told me then that more was required.] Of course I started thinking I had an abcess. It didn't ever hurt to bite on, but whenever I jolted my head, such as walking down the steep stairs out the front of the house, it was quite painful. When I went swimming it throbbed like crazy when I swam along the bottom of the pool. I was hoping it was to do with my cold, but I had a sneaking feeling I was going to lose the tooth as punishment for not going back to the dentist for nine months.

Then one morning, my toothache spread to the right side as well. Hurrah! Double toothache = cold-related-sinus-thingy! Hurrah! But I have made an appointment at the dentist. Phew.

Gappy Rees

Marcus lost a front tooth at lunchtime yesterday. He has lost 2 or 3 baby teeth already, but this is the first one to affect his smile. He is super-cute-Brady-Bunch-scamp-urchin gappy. He just needs a stripy t-shirt and a catcher's mitt to audition for All Purpose Perky American Primary School Kid. He has kept all his ejected teeth, in the interests of science, and has also declined to invest this one with the Tooth Fairy.