Ian is off to have a tooth extracted this morning. I suggested he ask the dentist to swear to take the tooth, the whole tooth, and nothing but the tooth.

I have a fear of dentists. Of course, no-one likes going to the dentist, but I am absolutely petrified. If I feel a small cavity developing, or a niggling pain, I ignore it and ignore it until it becomes a huge hole, a throbbing ache, then I ignore it and ignore it some more till I am banging my head on the wall and screaming in agony. Then I ignore it some more.

This tactic is, of course, stupid. It led to my having to have two root canals a few years ago. Trust me, you don't want to go through that process. It involved several trips to the dentist over a period of weeks. He opened the tooth up, removed all the foul-smelling infected pulp, pulled out the roots, enlarged the root canals. He drilled and drilled and drilled. I swear I am not telling a lie when I say I figure he must have drilled up past my nose and into my eye sockets. Oh, I tell you, just thinking about it is bringing me out in a cold sweat.

I swore after that that I'd never put myself through all that again. I promised I'd start paying regular visits to the dentist. Did I? Did I hell.

Every time I've been to a dentist, he has examined the X-rays, tutted, and said, "those wisdom teeth are badly impacted - they're growing sideways. They're going to have to come out some time, you know." I've left them and left them, till now they are exerting pressure on my other teeth.

My bottom teeth are particularly bad. I took a look at them in the mirror the other morning and - seemingly overnight - the one in the middle is leaning forward at an angle, trying to avoid the others crowding in behind it. Hang on, did I say "the one in the middle"? That can't be right, but - yes - there it is, a tooth where there should be a gap. Some mornings they all feel loose, too.

The Americans, of course, don't have these problems. Thanks to spending their teenage years in sadistic oral contraptions, they all have super-white, super-straight shiny pearly whites. I have English teeth, and they're rapidly turning into old people's teeth. Kids, listen to your elders! Go to the dentist! Now!