So I tend to stay up pretty late at night, looking good. The trouble is that around six am i get a bit tired, and subsequently may get forgetful. Such was the case on that fateful night in December: Right before I crashed out for the morning, I went downstairs to brush my teeth. Whimsically i looked in the medicine cab, and saw mad floss all piled up. So like the fashionable man-about-town that I am, I decided to rock the floss.
The trouble here is that if you never really floss, your gums are gonna bleed like a new red tee in with the whites. Danger Will Robinson! So i flossed, brushed and hit the listerine, and marched off to be lulled asleep by some record you're not Indie enough to know about. Just like always.
Well, the next morning I woke up in HELL. My gums hurt like a mutha, so I automatically blamed it on the wisdom teeth I can't really afford to be rid of pushing on my other teeth, resulting in some discomfort (it sorta makes sense, right?). Fortunately I'm pretty fookin' tuff, so i ate and rolled to work like always. The thing was that I TOTALLY FORGOT THAT I FLOSSED THE NIGHT BEFORE-because I'M THAT BRILLIANT! So as my workday progressed, I got really freaked out that the discomfort wasn't really going away, and was actually getting worse, because I was all pounding coffee and taking as many cigarrette breaks as i could get away with. Not to mention i kept all tonguing my gums, trying in vain to diagnose my problem for myself. By the time I rolled home I was pretty sure i had ignored my wisdom teeth long enough for then to put pressure on my teeth, and rip my gums up, which I then must have irritated by chain smoking and listening to The Murder City Devils too much at work. How could I go to another show when I was destined to be a deformity in a Botch T shirt, all bleeding from the gums? I was ruined.
Fortunately I had the NerdBox on, so i went to Google and typed in "Itchy Bleeding Gums". I saw a description of Gingivitis, and it mentioned bleeding gums, so I hooked that shit right up. It turns out that gingivitis is most frequently caused by poor/infrequent brushing habits, and can lead to this thang called PERIODONTIS, where basically your jaw rots away and your teeth all fall out (and you get kicked outta the scene).
None of this was cheering me up, because the weekend before I had stayed at J. Hotpins' place and had this nightmare wear all my teeth fell out (!) and I was a total toothless fucker. So I was pretty displeasured. Since the dumb bastards who make all dental sites on the web are hopelessly "well off", they seem to forget that dentists cost a ton of money, and that dumbass college graduates that insist on working at indie record stores don't have dental insurance, I decided to bomb my mouth with listerine and find some medicine for my sorry ass. I picked up some Orabase-B and applied it to my sorry gums and felt instant, total relief...for like 59 seconds, at which point i drooled that nasty crap onto my tongue, and promptly realized that it made my gums now feel all pastey, and it tasted gross.
So I rinsed with the Listerine and hit the same site, and checked out "treatments" the first thing it mentioned was flossing, and how if you don't do it often, it'll make your gums bleed and be itchy for a few days. Then i realized: I AM THE DUMBEST MOTHERFUCKER ALIVE...I FLOSSED THE NIGHT BEFORE SO OF COURSE MY GUMS WOULD BE ALL SORE. After triple checking I when downstairs, and flossed (which felt great, 'cause i was like scratching that itch, baby). The next day I felt fine and walked around knowing that I should be a bit less of a freakshow about when I start bleeding for no good reason- and try to be careful with that floss, 'cause it'll erase your memory.
So let my folly be a lesson, kids. Watch your back.