Well, I really like the dentist I picked. He did the cleaning himself. I'm not sure if it was because I was a new patient or what. I didn't notice a hygenist, but maybe he shares one with his partner or maybe it was her day off. Either way, he was very nice and friendly and chatty, but not in an annoying way. No surprise, I have a few cavities. Like I said, my teeth are very prone to cavities and it's been almost 3 years since I've last been. Unfortunately, one of them is so deep that it's possible when he is clearing it out to put in a filling that I'll end up needing an emergency root canal. Ugh. I've read up on it and it doesn't sound any more painful than getting a filling done, especially since it would be more of a preventative measure than anything. Apparently, it's once the root canal gets infected that things get all ugly and painful, but it's possible that in the clearing out for the cavity, my tooth will be weakened to the point that infection is basically inevitable, so doing the root canal at that time instead saves me an extra procedure and quite possibly lots of pain down the road. Anyway, my appointment is next Tuesday and hopefully it all goes well. I'm not as afraid of the root canal possibility now that I've read up on what it actually is, and if we have to do it next week it'll probably just save me the hassle in the future. Plus, then I can go around saying things like:

"Pwease be vewy cawefuw. Twy vewy, vewy hawd not to destwoy us."

and: "You wewe vague, you wewe howstiwe, you wewe bewwigewant!"

and: "A secwet pwan to fight infwation!"

(teehee! one of the funniest scenes, ever.)