fine!" Another woman put her hands on my shoulders. "I've seen it done before," she warned. "You'll end up with horse teeth on top and Chiclets on the bottom. Don't do it!"

I wavered for days then phoned a woman whose teeth had been veneered by Lituchy. She laughed when I asked if she had horse teeth or Chiclets. "Don't think of him as an ordinary dentist," Christine Criscione said. "Think of him as Michelangelo. When he's finished, you'll be amazed. You'll even find yourself acting differently. You'll have so much more confidence." Another of Lituchy's patients was happy to let me personally inspect his porcelain choppers. "It's unbelievable how good they make you feel," Richard Friedman said. A thousand bucks a tooth? "It's the best money you'll ever spend," he vowed.

I surrendered to the dentist's chair and squeezed my eyes shut. Two hours later, after the drill had buzzed down ten upper teeth, I looked at those stubs in the mirror and felt like Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother. Amazing how nostalgic I suddenly became for that old cob of horse corn.

Two days later, as I sat in the waiting room before the next appointment, the Bag Bad Wolf came through the door.

"It'll be a few minutes," Lituchy said. "Your veneers are on their way over from the lab. They're stalled on the 59th Street Bridge."