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You Can Never Be Too Rich,
Too Thin, Or Brush Your Teeth Too Often
by Mad Dog
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Brushing your teeth might soon be considered an important
part of a heart-healthy lifestyle, right alongside not smoking, getting
regular exercise, and eating lots of any food product that has a heart
on the package, a particularly fun prospect around Valentine’s
Day. |
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If there’s one thing
most of us dislike more than paying taxes, having to listen to a
disemboweled voice on the phone tell us over and over how important our
call is to them, or watching a fully clothed Super Bowl halftime show,
it’s going to the dentist. There’s something primally fear-inducing
about dentists, and it goes beyond the horrible soft rock music they
force you to listen to, a torture technique Szell, the dentist in Marathon
Man, only wishes he’d dreamed up. Well, if he were real. And
alive.
But going to a dentist is important
because good dental hygiene is a positive thing. Not only does it result
in less time spent listening to a drill whine as every bone in your head
vibrates, more money in your pocket rather than going to pay for someone
else’s new boat, and increased social opportunities with members of
the opposite sex, it turns out it can also reduce the risk of a heart
attack and stroke. Oh yeah, and help you lose weight.
Who ever thought brushing your teeth
had so many benefits? Had my mother explained this to me when I was
young rather than using the argument that if I didn’t brush my teeth
they’d all fall out and my only career opportunity would be as a Moms
Mabley imitator I might have been more prone to do it rather than run
the water in the bathroom while I scrubbed the side of the sink with my
toothbrush. And to think, my mother always wondered why her friends
would comment about how the sink in the bathroom was so incredibly clean
and shiny.
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It turns out that while you’re brushing your teeth to help
prevent a heart attack you’re also helping keep your weight down. Hey,
it doesn’t get any better than this. Well, not unless we were to find
out that brushing our teeth also makes Jessica Simpson invisible.
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The first bit of tooth brushing news comes courtesy of Columbia
University, where researchers discovered that people with gum disease
were more likely to suffer from a narrowing of blood vessels, a
condition that can lead to stroke, heart attack, and fuzzy thinking
which can cause you to choose a college major that results in your being
handed big piles of grant money to scrape gunk off people’s teeth and
look at it under a microscope. At least I hope that’s their excuse.
This news means brushing your teeth might soon be considered an
important part of a heart-healthy lifestyle, right alongside not
smoking, getting regular exercise, and eating lots of any food product
that has a heart on the package, a particularly fun prospect around
Valentine’s Day. But that’s not all, it turns out that while
you’re brushing your teeth to help prevent a heart attack you’re
also helping keep your weight down. Hey, it doesn’t get any better
than this. Well, not unless we were to find out that brushing our teeth
also makes Jessica Simpson invisible.
This new twist comes courtesy of a
survey published in the Journal of the Japan Society for the Study of
Obesity (motto: “Fatty tuna, not fatty people”) that found a
correlation between being slim and brushing your teeth after every meal,
giving birth to the new diet catch phrase, “You can never be too rich,
too thin, or brush your teeth too often.” They say the connection
isn’t from the exercise you get brushing your teeth, after all,
according to a calorie burning calculator I found on a web site — and
if you can’t believe that what can you believe? — brushing your
teeth for one minute burns a whopping three calories. In other words,
even if you brushed your teeth for five minutes, three times a day,
you’d still only expend 45 calories, which is about the same number
you’ll find in one teaspoon of butter, one cup of broccoli, five jelly
bellys, or an infinite amount of water.
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Do
not — Repeat: do not — use a toilet brush on your teeth. Maybe you
think this is crazy, but there’s at least one brush manufacturer
that’s not so sure. |
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According to the researchers, the real reason members of the
Clean Teeth Club tend to be thin is that those who take care of their
teeth are more prone to be the type of people who also take care of the
rest of their body. Still, they claim “tooth brushing would play a
role in maintaining health and would help prevent obesity,” and if I
wasn’t so busy brushing my teeth in the hopes of shedding a few pounds
I’d agree.
Something tells me that once this
news gets out it won’t be long before we see toothpaste ads
trumpeting, “Lose weight with Crest!” and “Colgate helps fight
heart disease!” And why not, they already claim to reduce cavities,
plaque, gingivitis, dingy teeth, bad breath, and everything short of the
federal deficit, why not weight too? Then the toothbrush companies will
get into the act, which brings up another point. Do not — Repeat: do
not — use a toilet brush on your teeth. Maybe you think this is crazy,
but there’s at least one brush manufacturer that’s not so sure.
That’s why they won first prize in the Michigan Lawsuit Abuse Watch
Wacky Warning Label contest this year for having a warning on their
toilet brush that says: “Do not use for personal hygiene.” Thanks
for the warning, guys.
So keep those teeth clean. Remember,
clean teeth mean clean arteries. And slimmer arteries. Not to mention
less time having to listen to horrible soft rock music. Pass the floss,
will you?
©2005 Mad Dog
Productions, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
These columns appear in better newspapers across the country.
Read them while brushing your teeth.
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