It went smoothly. I have a great dentist. (Did I say that already?) He was there when I got my teeth cracked and bent 25 years ago during my senior year of hoops at Kaimuki. The teeth were repaired and destined to be replaced, capped or crowned soon after. I never went through with it. The teeth "healed" sorta and I never saw the need to fix 'em.

Anyway, now that my entire toothdom is undergoing renovation (sort of life Punahou's Hemmeter Fieldhouse), it was time to crown those cracked teeth. Along the way, I mentioned to doc and the staff that when all the fix-ums are done, I want my teeth whitened. Sure, it's vain, but if your teeth were as yellowed as mine, you'd be in need, too.

Of course, my mistake today was not reminding the doc about this, and after he and his assistant put two temporary crowns in my mouth, I wondered why they were so not white. I called back and a receptionist informed me that I should've scheduled bleaching beforehand. That seemed odd to me, but that's the order, the normal order of events.

So she said to call back later to see if there was no way that I would be, to paraphrase, stuck with yellowish brown teeth forever -- to match the soon-to-be permanent crowns.

It took me awhile to digest, and I called back one more time. It just didn't make sense that doc or any other dentist would put unhealthy looking crowns in my mouth or anyone else's. The receptionist explained it to me this time. The trick is to get the teeth bleached first so that the doc can match the color of the permanent crowns to the new "white" teeth.

Now that made sense. You know, I just didn't ask questions today. Doc was quiet, assistant did her job. I didn't disrupt their rhythm. HOWEVER ... that's the end of my silencio patient days. From now on, I ask every question that comes to mind.

Even with insurance, this stuff ain't cheap, and they could've answered my questions easily if only I'd asked. I can't expect the doc to be talkative all the time, nor should I ever expect him to remember something I asked for a year ago.

So when visiting your dentist and doctor, ask away, gang. Ask, ask, ask. It's your mouth, your body, your money. It's your toothdom.

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