White Teeth and Promises
2004-09-09, 11:15 a.m.

Remember Slime? The stuff in the plastic garbage pail with the optional rubber worms, that your mom made you play with outside after you ground it into the shag carpet accidentally on purpose? The stuff that dried to something that closely resembled snot when you left it in the sun?

Dilute it, mix it with hydrogen peroxide, and you have Colg@te Simply W*h*i*t*e tooth-whitening gel.

I love/hate my teeth. Love them because they are impervious to whatever I shovel their way. I have never had a cavity. I hate them because my front teeth are big, Bucky Beaver big, my-God-you�ve-got-big-front-teeth big. Live with them I must, so they ought to at least be bright and shiny. Enter vanity, exit $4.99 for a bottle of Shiny White Promises.

The directions were sinfully simple. Paint the stuff on your teeth and don�t eat or drink for 15 minutes, no problemo. What they don�t tell you is that it takes just long enough to apply that it makes you salivate like a rabid dog, in effect washing the stuff off before you can complete the application. It tastes�like foamy slime. It felt like I was morphing into Cujo.

After spitting and retching, I opened my mouth for a looksee. It was like watching Jabba the Hut break into an oozy grin. EWWWWWWWWWWWW White or no white, this stuff is just wrong. Disgustingly wrong. And you�re supposed to go through this twice a day for two weeks in the name of dental hygiene? There is NOTHING hygienic about a mouthful of slime strings. Seeing the slug trails on my front sidewalk is one thing, deliberately applying it to my teeth is another.

It might be useful at Hallowe�en. I could answer the door as an evil rabid snail and scare the bejeebers out of a multitude of sugary-high candy-whoring trick-or-treaters. Oh yeah, Sally and her rabbit teeth are hatching a plan. This year, Hallowe�en will be more fun than ever. Bring it on.

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