if a tree falls on a dentist's office

At my most recent visit to the dentist back in May of this year, along with the usual scolding about not flossing enough (re: "ever"), I was given, on my way out, what could be best described as a "grab bag of failure." Therein, along with my usual dinosaur toothbrush kit (per request), I was also given several metric tons of dental floss in a variety of colorways, lengthways, flavourways, and "waxways."

On the way home, I got to thinking about all the dental floss in the trunk of the sedan. "Has anyone in the history of the world, ever even finished a carton of dental floss?" "Are there prizes hidden at the bottom of the plastic spool?" If only floss could promise to be the dentil hygienic equivalent to a Cracker Jack (back when Cracker Jack didn't suck balls, of course), would the masses flock to it, not only for promise of healthy gums, but for whimsical-sounding whistles, and cheap stickers.
Maybe the ending to a spool of dentil floss was like the proverbial tree falling in the forest--if no one bothers enough with flossing to completely unravel it, does it even exist? Not one to back down from a bitter hygienist's one-two punch (stern reproach and provocation), I decided to accept her sneering dental gauntlet and actually use the floss she'd thrown at my feet.

spitefully yours

Contrary to the smaller, "travel sized" spools also in my collection, with regard to the particular waxed, mint-flavourway I'd decided to challenge, Johnson & Johnson hadn't even bothered to disclose how much floss might be wound within. Neither five yards (trial-sized), nor fifty-five yards (standard government issue), for all I knew, this would be five-hundred and fifty-five times infinitum.

At first, I thought about just unwinding it, straight-away. A leash for a pet, line for a fishing pole, or better still, perhaps I could tie 32 lengths to a doorknob and 32 teeth, and with a single slam of the door, relieve someone of an entire mouthful of pearly whites. On and on, I busied myself with finding amusing ways to dispose of miles upon miles of string I knew I'd never use.

But the sense of challenge and my hygienist's contemptuous smirk prevailed, and I vowed to floss every night until infinitum had been quantified, and kicked repeatedly in the balls from a boot wrapped in the unwaxed string. Perhaps in the "whiskey" flavourway (still a Johnson & Johnson exclusive to the original 7 confederate states, I understand).

But alas, last night, even infinitum has its limits. It took all of five months, and for the first time ever, I've finally reached the bottom of a container of floss.

And what do you suppose I found? A miniature collection of knock-knock jokes? A tiny sock puppet monkey? A stamp-sized portrait of Barack Obama? Scratch & sniff stickers? iTunes store download codes? A map to a pot of gold? No, no, no, no, no, and shitthatwouldhavebeenawesome.

Not a goddamn thing.

For successfully conning me into healthier teeth and gums, my crooked-ass hygienist had better be flipping a freaking cartwheel right about now, because I sure as hell am not.