I visited the dentist today to have a small cavity filled. The doctor warned me that he would be using a laser to remove the decayed part and that it would be incredibly dangerous** but he believed the danger was outweighed by the swiftness of the process and the ease of the procedure. Ease for him, of course. Danger for the patient.
So it was with extreme trepidation that I sat down in the chair. He has new offices, obviously paid for by us, the gullible clients. (He calls us "guests" by the way. HA!) Before I could even ask a simple question like "How dangerous is the laser?" he had a swab with some drug on it jammed between my rotting tooth and my gum. Within a minute my gum and tongue were numb. I still was able to ask about the laser and he assured me that yes, he could totally vaporize anything with the laser. The rotting part of the tooth, the entire tooth if he so desired.
Foolishly, now under the influence of gum and mind-numbing drugs delivered on a Q-tip, I asked "Could you vaporize something bigger?" and he replied "Well, yes. Say you had a friend you didn't like anymore, so not really a friend and you wanted him gone, I could make that happen." He proceeded to tell me that he took appointments for very late at night, like midnight and he had a different dental assistant named Vinnie because the work was just too difficult for the girl assistants and that he had a room in the back, lined with plastic, and he could totally vaporize an entire body!
Of course, by this time, I was laughing out loud, with the swab still sticking out of my mouth, and he gave me some nice, salient details that made me laugh more. With a laser, depending on the size, you can cut through anything. Harken back to the movie "Goldfinger" when Bond, James Bond is tied to a metal table and the laser is inching up that table, dissolving it, getting closer and closer to Bond's junk..... that could actually happen and hey, that was like 50 years ago! So prescient, those Bond movies.
But back to today. After about 5 minutes, he shows me the laser and gets to work. It took about 5 minutes for him to laser out the bad part of the decay and he used a drill-like thing to smooth the edges of the cavity ("lasers don't smooth things out. Yet.") He lasered a little more and then he put in some new filling compound and cemented it in with another laser! I did the biting thing a couple of times and Done! The entire process took maybe 15 minutes (not counting the sucking on the drug lollipop which could have gone on for a while since it was obviously affecting my brain as well and I like that sort of thing) and it did not hurt one teeny bit and involved no needles! No shots! And there wasn't that smell you get when they drill and your tooth goes up in smoke. It was amazingly easy and tidy.
We chatted a few more minutes and when I left, the numbness in my tongue and gum were gone. Very, very impressive, especially for someone who has had probably about 80 trips to the dentist in my lifetime, just for fillings.
Along the way, we talked about lots of other things. This is a smart guy. Very into the science of the body, but not in a Sebastopol way, not all "here's what my urine says today" but just tuned into how the body works and how it changes every day. Plus he's as cute as a box of puppies with really good teeth, which never hurts.
So, laughing out loud in the dentist chair, that hasn't happened in a long time and it was greatly appreciated. And my tooth is whole, happy and lasered! I was going to ask for a discount because I avoided the really garlicky meatballs in my fridge last night for the sake of the dentist, but he made me laugh so much I forgot! Nice work, Laser-Man!
** kidding, he never said anything like that and the laser is totally not dangerous unless you aim it at the wrong thing. Like your knee or the window or a person. Just saying......
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