What are you doing next Thursday, June 7, at 7pm? How bout going down to the Coolidge Corner Theatre to watch my production team win an award for the 48 Hour Film Project, and watch 12 other winning short films? I don’t know what we’re winning, but we’re winning something. And one of the judges is Scorsese’s editor.

Come on down!

Nothing to report. My “cant” is still “crooked”, says the doc. They popped off two brackets, re-glued them, put on lighter wires, clipped the wires on the left side, and are making me wear two elastics from the top canines to the bottom ones. B-O-R-I-N-G.

This will never end.

I originally made this in 2004-5. It’ll be on the upcoming Ryan Montbleau DVD.

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Tapioca Productions rocked it this year. Required genre, unfortunately, was spy. But our ridiculously great team pulled it off.

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Oddly, I will miss this experience when it’s over.

Today Doc’s office was packed. Six or seven of us were getting treated in different chairs all at once. “Business is good, eh?” I asked. Business IS good. Because, despite his inappropriate innuendos (“you get a special wire because you’re a special patient, not to say that you’re special to me, ’cause you’re not…”) my Doc is rather excellent in what he does. Even if I’m six months over my treatment time.

Today was great because:

(1) Nothing hurt.

(2) My third favorite ortho assistant worked on me. Between pulling a latex chain across all my upper teeth and inserting new brackets, he confided that he, too, has braces on, that once he hit 30 he gained 15 pounds that won’t come off, that he’s recently changed his diet to include all-natural granola, colon pills, and special power juice (he showed me the granola), and that he’s really impressed with my progress. What a nice guy!

(3) After putting on a very heavy “special wire”, within 10 minutes — literally — my upper teeth were completely straight (one of the front teeth had started floating away this past month, when the wire was cut).

(4) I convinced my doc to NOT shave my bottom teeth, by way of a pleading imperative (“I’ve decided I’m not going to let you shave my bottom teeth. They’re already too small!” — which he argued, then gave up arguing.)

(5) This exchange happened, after they put on an elastic which I’m supposed to wear every night when I sleep, which starts at the top right FIC (formerly impacted canine) and goes all the way across to my lower left bottom teeth, making it impossible to, um, move or breathe:

ME: “This is completely not feasible.”
DOC: “Why? What’s the problem with it? Open your mouth.”
ME: “I can’t.”
DOC: “Bite down.”
ME: “I can’t.” (True fact: within 10 minutes after putting the new wire on, my teeth moved so quickly that my bite got even weirder — I can now only put my right-side molars together.)
DOC: “Oh, cmon, it’s not that bad. You just have to sleep with it on.”
ME: “I CAN’T sleep with it on! I can’t open my mouth or lick my lips or anything! I call tell you I’ll sleep with it on, but I’ll be lying.”
DOC: (Whispering) “Listen, there are other patients here. Just wear it, ok?”
ME: “No way, it’s totally insane, I can’t even get it off, and it hurts. I don’t like it.”
DOC: “I DON’T CARE IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT!”
ME: “…Well, somebody has a four-year-old at home…”
(Laughter ensues)

A few more months of this, apparently.