Dr. Rod Kurthy

Interview Questions

Rod, I see your face everywhere, from the cover of Dental Town magazine to your website, to marketing pieces for your lectures, to the cover of your books! While so many dentists are glum, you look like the happiest guy in the profession! What's up with THAT?!

Oh come on Josh! You know what's up with THAT! Just like you, I love dentistry, but even more so, I love talking dentistry with other dentists, I love lecturing - it's my passion and has been for over three decades.

Your website is www.DeepBleaching.com www.rodtheideaguy.com. But I KNOW there's a LOT more there than Deep Bleaching, like perio, marketing, etc. What's the big idea, big guy?! Is it Deep Bleaching? Is it laser perio? Is it marketing? Please tell us!

I've tried to accomplish a few things with the website. We get calls - numerous calls and emails - every single day from potential patients from all over the country and even internationally. They hear about Deep Bleaching or stumble over it on the thousands of websites that talk about it on the Internet. These patients are impressed by the fact that Deep Bleaching is 100% predictable, the most effective bleaching technique ever developed, that it's totally permanent, low to no sensitivity, AND that they can STILL drink their red wine, coffee, tea, etc.

So we want to drive these patients to dentists in their area that are using Deep Bleaching. To this end, I've made a "patients" side of the DeepBleaching.com website where they can see many, many before and after photos, read all about Deep Bleaching AND see a 20 minute video of me discussing Deep Bleaching and why it's so exciting. And we give them a contact link to provide us with up to six zip codes that they live in and close to, and we then provide them the names and contact info for all dentists in these zip codes doing Deep Bleaching.

We have dentists that will place a link on their websites right to our patient video page to further convince potential new patients to select their offices.

And of course the main side of the website is for "dental professionals". We don't want patients to see the costs of products and hear otherwise "sensitive" information, so we use some methods to keep non-dental professionals off that side of the site.

On the dental professionals side of the site dentists will find more information than they'll ever need about Deep Bleaching, including an in-depth video by me on Deep Bleaching, as well as a separate video on case presentation (sales) of Deep Bleaching.

And of course you already know that for thirty years I've been involved in the original development of many other topics from surgical bone regeneration to bonded cosmetic porcelain restorations. You'll find books that I've written such as effective classy dental marketing that dentists can actually be PROUD to have their competitors see, information to determine if you should really get a laser, how to make money with a laser and my non-surgical diode laser periodontal protocol.

And there's a lot more, but this answer's getting a bit too long already!

Your private practice is in Mission Viejo, California. I imagine old padres walking down a dusty trail with little burros carrying supplies to the poor people. Please...tell me I'm mistaken! Most people have never heard of Mission Viejo unless they have kids that swim competitively. Aside from being the World Headquarters of the Mission Viejo Turkey Classic Swim Meet and the World Headquarters of Rod Kurthy, what is Mission Viejo's claim to fame?

Well, we were the national headquarters for the 1994 Men's United States World Cup Soccer Team, of which I had the honor to be the team dentist. We're just inland from Laguna Beach and Newport Beach. And where I live, Coto de Caza, we have the rather infamous (and embarrassing) notability of being the community where the film "The Real Housewives of Orange County". I cringe every time I even hear about that program! But truly, this area of Southern California is incredibly beautiful.

I get the idea that dentistry is not only your job, but it's also your hobby. What do you like to do in your "spare" time?

Well, the truth of the matter is that I have no spare time. With all the things that I do and my dental practice, seven days a week I'm doing some sort of work related to dentistry from 6:30am until at least 1:30am. But as you said, this is not work for me, and I'm incredibly lucky that Sharon, my wife of over 26 years, has always shared in this passion with me and works right beside me. So if anything, this brings us closer together.

When our kids were younger, we made time for them during the day and worked late into the night while they were sleeping.

Our son Chad is 25 and an Orange County firefighter, and our daughter Shannon, who you've seen is our cover girl, just graduated from college and is now our Director of Business Development at Evolve. She's been involved with us in what we do for several years now, and she's so excited that we can't even get her to shut up about Evolve when she's eating dinner with us! LOL!! She's as bad as her dad!

Southern California is famous for Mexican food and California cuisine. What is your favorite food? Favorite restaurant?

My favorite Mexican food? Anything made by my amazing RDAEF Nellie Vargas!! She's as good of a Mexican cook as she is a dental assistant! But as you can easily see, I have many "favorite" foods and restaurants - we've got plenty of 'em around here.

What is your favorite film? Favorite actor? Do you have any celebrities as patients? Who?

Favorite film - the first two Godfather movies of course.
Favorite actor Spencer Tracy.
Yes, over the years I've had several celebs as patients. I've never felt comfortable trying to get them to give me permission to give out their names, but I probably should. One was a young movie and television star that died from an overdose. He was my favorite of any famous people I've treated. A real shame - he tried but just couldn't get away from his demons.

One of my patients has three Superbowl rings. One husband and wife are billionaires. Probably the majority are professional athletes.

What business books have been most influential to you?

I've never read one.

What mentors have had the most impact on you and why?

Oh man! Lemme think. One would have to be my 8th and 9th grade science teacher. I went to dental school because of him. Another would be my friend Dr. Noah Chivian. Every endo that I do has been influenced by him. The business of dentistry was learned from my old friend Dr. Melvin Feiler. Soon after my residency he brought me into his organization as a junior partner and taught me how to be financially successful in dentistry and lit my marketing interest flame. My best friend, Howie Horrocks (owner of New Patients, Inc.) and I have sorta been each other's marketing mentors for years.

You recently launched a brand new company to bring your Deep Bleaching products and services directly to dentists. You've also been in business with your bud, Howie Horrocks. How did you manage to start your own incredibly successful companies in the middle of a busy schedule of treating patients? What were the challenges?

Well actually, Howie and I have never been in business with each other. We compliment each other. Every time we get together it turns out to be one huge brainstorming session. We're just great friends that learn from and support each other.

As far as starting Evolve Dental Technologies, my wife and I never really wanted to do that. Our plate was not only full, but overflowing, and we just didn't have time. That's why I associated with another company. But that went down hill after they fired their CEO, who was the one I'd worked with and got along with well - and who actually listened to me. When he was gone, things went downhill and I felt I had to disassociate myself from them.

So we really had no other choice than to start Evolve, and now we wish we'd done it long before. We haven't taken a vacation now in a year and a half, and none at all in sight - we're just wayyyy too busy. But we're having incredible fun with this. We don't have some company telling us that we can't do this or that because there's no profit in it, or because it's too difficult, or because, or because, or because.

So we're able to do things the way we're proud of and love to do. And we've also found that what goes around, comes around, because the business is doing well financially too.

The challenges setting up Evolve? Well, we didn't want to take on any investors, because investors are interested in one thing and one thing only - PROFITS. Obviously you must make profits in business, but Sharon and I feel there is more to "success" than just profits. Just as important, or really, more important is enjoying and being proud of what we're doing. So we formed this company with our own money, and that was pretty scary.

But we felt that if we provided "the real deal" with honesty, enthusiasm and integrity, and if our goal was simply helping dentists with any question or problem that they have (about anything - not just Deep Bleaching), that we'd be fine in the long run.

What did you do before you had your own practice? What is your educational background--besides dentistry?

My dad was an auto mechanic from age 11, when he had to quit school to help support his family, until he retired in his 70's. He was an incredible athlete all his life, in fact he was my aunt's first diving coach, and she went on to become the most famous woman diver in history, capturing both gold medals in two consecutive Olympics. My dad was still a double black diamond skier when he died of a brain tumor in his mid-80's.

He and my mom were very artistic, so both my brother and I developed talents in both mechanical perception and art. In college it was a toss-up between first, mechanical engineering, followed by zoology.

After finishing dental school at Fairleigh Dickinson University in 1978, I did a GPR at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center. Soon after that I became a junior partner in Eastern Dental Centers, owned by senior partner Dr. Melvin Feiler. And then I moved back home to Southern California and set up my own practice.

Where did you learn most of what you know about marketing, bleaching, laser perio?

Marketing - Melvin Feiler got me interested in marketing. In my own practice, I sorta learned by doing. It was always on my mind. I used to attend courses by so-called dental marketing experts, and I was always put off by what they taught. It just didn't make sense to me, and I had my own ideas. Several times I gave various dental marketing companies a pile of money, and came up totally empty. Finally I took the ideas that I had developed over the years and designed my own direct mail pieces, and they were very, very successful. THEN I stumbled upon this book by some "dental marketing jerk" by the name of Howie Horrocks, and the book was called "Unlimited New Patients". Well, I figured, "Hmmmm. Just another of those idiots who THINK they know dental marketing", but I bought the book and read it anyway.

HOLY MOLY!! This Howie guy thought EXACTLY the way I did - it was if he'd crawled inside my head. I JUST HAD TO MEET THIS GUY. And we've been best friends ever since.

As for perio - I participated in my first perio research about 32 years ago with Dr. Michael Alfano, who many reading have heard of. I did two of the earlier clinical studies of guided bone regeneration. I've "piddled around" with developing perio techniques for years, and I've been interviewed a few times regarding them. My current technique originally sprang from the results of the 1989 World Workshop in Clinical Periodontics, held at Princeton University.

I took a week by myself in Palm Springs to sit at the pool all day, every day, going over and over the results of the Workshop proceedings and formulated my technique - this was the starting point and I've been refining my technique ever since.

After getting involved with lasers a number of years ago, it occurred to me that certain attributes of the laser would likely enhance the technique at that point, and of course the rest is history.

As far as bleaching, nothing I ever read helped. It was all the same mumbo-jumbo - results of testing the same things over and over - I read about the studies and the results, but nobody ever answered the questions of WHY we see what we see and WHY bleaching often doesn't work, and WHY teeth often get sensitive during bleaching.

So I just poked and prodded in my own practice, testing and testing things with the goal of being able to figure out WHY - I wanted to know WHY some teeth bleached more easily than others - WHY we have sensitivity - WHY to just about everything.

Fridays were my clinical testing days for years and years. Everywhere I'd go I'd enlist test victims patients. I always used split-arch testing, where we'd do one thing on one side and a different thing on the other side. And when there was a noticeable difference from side to side, of course I'd then even it up for the patients. So there is a load of patients in the Mission Viejo area with white teeth that they got for free.

Once I understood WHY everything happens, I was able to figure out how to put it all to work to create Deep Bleaching.

A lot of companies offer bleaching products and techniques. DCA members are always concerned about the comfort--or lack of it--with bleaching. Tell us how your Deep Bleaching products and techniques are different and how they address that sensitivity issue that drives us all crazy!

Well, I haven't been able to figure out how to shrink myself down to molecular size, so what I'll say is my theory. But I've taken these theories and tested and tested to see if it appears that I'm correct, and I believe that I am.

We all know that the current theory of dentinal sensitivity is via the Hydrodynamic Mechanism of inward or outward movement of dentinal tubular fluid movement. Flow in tubules mechanically activates the nerves found at the inner ends of the tubules or in the outer layers of the pulp, causing a painful reaction.

"Dentin Hydraulic Conductance" refers to the ease with which fluid flows through dentinal tubules.

And we know that when the smear plugs are lost from the tubular orifices, this conductance goes up a whopping 32-fold!!!

So just imagine the 'scrubbing action' of the oxygen given off by bleaching gels, and imagine all of the smear plugs being removed, AND imagine the osmotic gradient created by bleaching gel at the orifices of these open tubules, causing tubular flow.

Many recommend the use of products with potassium nitrate, and I have nothing against that, but in general that is like putting a Band-Aid on a cut instead of preventing the cut in the first place.

Many dentists mistakenly believe that potassium nitrate plugs dentinal tubules - it does not. It obtunds the neurons. And it takes some time to work it's way down the tubules and get into the pulp before it has effect. This is why many say to have your patients use potassium nitrate for two week before bleaching.

I see no problem with using potassium nitrate, but I'd personally rather prevent the problem in the first place by plugging the tubules and preventing the hydrodynamic movement of the tubular fluids.

I was the first to popularize a bleaching system including desensitizing as part of the bleaching technique. And now it seems that all the big companies out there are copying that. But these big bleaching companies out there use products with potassium nitrate - potassium nitrate is cheap to put in bleaching kits.

I use a combination of both an inorganic system of plugging the tubules (oxalate) and an organic system of plugging the tubules (HEMA).

These desensitizers are incredibly expensive, but like I said, we don't have some company telling us what we can and can't do, so we "just do it", because we believe in it and want everything we do to be "the real deal".

What advice do you have for DCA members who are trying to bring in patients who are looking for a more comfortable experience in the dental office?

Wow, how many hours do you have for me to answer that? Well, "more comfortable" is not just a physical thing - there is mental comfort too, and that's just as important as physical comfort.

Of course look for techniques, products and instruments that cause less or no discomfort, and yes, such as the laser perio technique, such as Deep Bleaching, and a whole lot more things.

Use injection techniques that not only do not cause pain, but where the patient tells you that they could not even feel that you were touching them.Offer OCS (Oral Conscious Sedation), such as taught by DOCS.

And be sure to EFFECTIVELY and PROFESSIONALLY market all this to your target audience. In marketing, believability is king.

Just imagine if you truly believed every TV commercial, every magazine ad, every type of marketing. Heck, you'd be out there buying everything. But that's not the case. People don't believe advertising anymore - even when that marketing piece is by a local dentist.

So you can say all the wonderful and impressive things you want, but if they don't have any reason to believe you, they WON'T!!! So you've got to do it in a way that MAKES THEM BELIEVE YOU, from the very instant they see your mailing piece or any other marketing.

Do dentists really need market? Some of us feel uncomfortable advertising. Can't we just rely on word of mouth alone? Doesn't advertising make us look desperate for new patients?

Well truthfully, many dentists in the good ol' US of A do NOT need to market. Believe it or not, many of our colleagues out there are in fat city without spending one dollar on marketing. Places like that do still exist.

But for many of us - those of us in competitive areas - yes, you do need to market. Sure, we'd all like to believe that if we're really, reallllly good at what we do and how we take care of our patients, that they'll soon be lining up at our door. Nope, that's not how it works nowadays.

If you practice in a competitive area and you want to really be rockin' and rollin', you need to get the word out to people and make yourself totally irresistible to the very best patients. That ain't easy to do.

My definition of a "good patient" is a patient who will come in and respect me and my staff, listen intently to my recommendations, schedule and pay for the treatment I've recommended, return for recalls and refer others to me. Believe me, I've just described someone who truly values dentistry and oral health and wants only the best for themselves and their families.

If you were to interview 100 "good patients", I'm sure all would say that they'd NEVER select a dentist from a marketing ad. So your marketing piece has got to be SO POWERFUL, SO IMPRESSIVE and SO BELIEVABLE that they these "good patients" totally forget that it's a marketing piece and run to the phone to call you.

This type of marketing is something that "feels good" to us - and we're proud for our colleagues to see it. So obviously I'm NOT talking about the ads that look corny and have coupon offers to bring in patients. As Howie says, "If your best foot forward is a freebee offer, you have no feet!"

This is why both of my marketing books are titled, "The No-Coupon Marketable Dentist". This means that you make yourself "marketable" - in other words, "irresistible to your target audience". Now, in most areas of the country, there's nothing wrong with a well-designed tasteful "offer", but it sure as heck must NOT be THE reason that the recipient of your marketing comes to see you - otherwise all you get is bargain hunters and looky-loos.

What can your company do for DCA dentists and their patients to help bring more comfortable dentistry into our offices?

That would be my books and my Deep Bleaching system. The marketing books give you the ability to market to the "good patients" to let them know what you can offer them, and have them actually believe it. The laser perio protocol is performed with the least expensive laser on the market (the diode laser), and Zap Lasers have their for sale often less than $8,000. This technique is not only simple for dentist and patient, but the results are astounding. You can see examples of the bone regeneration at www.DeepBleaching.com under the books section.

And of course there is Deep Bleaching with the low sensitivity, and before anyone decides to jump into this, I'd recommend watching the two videos on the "dental professionals" side of the website to see if Deep Bleaching is for you, because it definitely is NOT for every practice.

What business principles have made you so successful?

I'm not sure really how to answer that. I've never considered, and still do not consider myself a "businessman" in the least. I sure could not get up and lecture even for one minute on "business principles".

My best answer is that I love dentistry and I've never been satisfied with the status quo - so I've always searched, researched, tested and tested things, and this has resulted in a lot of innovation. Combine that with the fact that I have a BIG MOUTH and love to talk with dentists, and the result is that much of my stuff is now out there being used by thousands of dentists who don't have a clue who developed the things they're doing.

But this was never really "business". I've been doing this for 30 years, but until just a short few years ago, I never made a cent, or wanted to make a cent from anything that I did. All my testing and developing cost me tons of money, but I did it because I love it. It wasn't until dentist after dentist on DentalTown.com urged me to write my first marketing book that I actually made any income from other than my dental practice. In fact, when I wrote the book, the only financial concern my wife and I had was that we hoped we'd not loose too much money on publishing the book.

Then more recently Deep Bleaching came along, and again, dentist after dentist pushed and poked and prodded me to develop my own products and especially a desensitizing technique. And that led to Evolve.

AND with Evolve, believe me, neither my wife or I have any business training, so we're learning as we go along. But we have faith that if we do everything with the right motives, that things will work out, and so far so good.

If I had to answer this question about you, my answer would be "enthusiasm!"

What one adjective describes you?

Well, I think you're right. The term "enthusiastic" is at least pretty close. The other term would be "sincere". One thing that has bothered me, and I guess I shouldn't let it (but it does anyway), is that over the past few years, some have seen that "enthusiasm" that you speak of and have mistaken that for me trying to sell something. And I can understand that this could happen - for example, I'm super-enthusiastic about my diode laser periodontal protocol because I know how well it works and I want others to benefit from that - but some see my enthusiasm and believe that it's just that I want to "sell a book." When my motives are 100% sincere, this does bother me a bit.

Many of us have looked into marketing before and it always sounds so expensive. How can we justify a monthly expense like marketing when our budgets are already stretched to the max?

Well, budgets have a lot to do with the amount of income. For example, when your volume goes up, your percentage of overhead goes way down - your fixed expenses stay the same and many of your variable expenses don't even go up as much as your gross income.

Bottom line is that your dental practice and everything inside it (including you and your staff) are worthless without patients - good patients. So if you want to be successful, nothing is more important - in fact nothing is AS important as getting patients into your practice, and proper, impressive, tasteful and effective marketing will do just that.

How long does it take to see real results in terms of new patients scheduling directly from our marketing investment? How long should we wait if we're not seeing results? And then what do we do?

This all depends on a few factors. First of all, how aggressive is the dentist in marketing? Does the dentist go about it with tiptoes? Or does the dentist jump in with both feet? Does the dentist try to just look for whatever is cheapest, or does the dentist go for the best? Is the dentist willing to put forth a lot of work of his or her own, or does the dentist just want some company to come in and do it for them?

The fastest results and the most effective results are when a dentist makes the decision and goes forward full steam ahead - and when the dentist does all the work to make him or herself "marketable" -- in other words, develops things that make the dentist credible, believable, impressive, etc. - to set this dentist aside from other dentists in the area in an extremely positive and believable way. And THEN the dentist must work with a professional marketing agency that really knows what they're doing. And the dentist does not hold back on the frequency of marketing.

When all the above is done, it can come very, very quickly.

Let me tell you a story - it's about a dentist that I think you know Josh, but I don't want to divulge his name.

Several years ago a dentist contacted me, nearly on the verge of suicide. He was in a terrible mess. He'd gotten wrapped up in a very popular dentist turned practice consultant who taught everyone to be a "cosmetic only" dentist. Long story short, this dentist's practice was good, but had been going down slowly for a few years, and he saw the writing on the wall - and he wanted to boost his practice.

Well, as I said, he listened to the wrong guy. By the time he'd listened to this practice consultant, this dentist had virtually no patients left. He'd become "cosmetic only", and had lost all his patients. And the flood of cosmetic patients that this dentist/consultant had promised him never showed up.

He was living off of loans from the bank and nearly running out of these funds. He was facing loss of his home, his practice - everything he owned. He contacted me and told me his story and asked for help. Both my wife and I felt compelled to help him, and told him that we would help on one condition. We'd offer help if and only if he promised to do exactly what we would tell him to do. And he agreed.

I had him use my marketing techniques, and my wife told him how to go about getting his previous patients back into his office. He followed all my marketing steps to make himself "marketable" and then went to Howie (New Patients, Inc.) to actually perform the marketing. I've never seen anyone go through all the steps as quickly as he did. And he was true to his word - he did everything we told him to do immediately.

He started seeing daylight within weeks of first talking with us. This was probably about around 2004 or so. And today he's still a solo practitioner and is averaging $140,000 per month - that's $1,680,000 per year!!! And he's still following those same instructions today.

What sage advice can you quote that is relevant to DCA members?

I don't think that there are many things that apply to everyone across the board - I think that advice has to be individualized somewhat. But one thing does stand out in my mind that relates to a very, very common problem among dentists. Here it is:

Never go to a course where you learn even just one pearl and fail to incorporate it on Monday morning. Far too many dentists do this - they go to a course or read an article and say, "Wow, that sounds great! I think I'll use that!", but the vast majority never ever incorporate these things.

For years I'd attend CE courses, and at lunch or at breaks I'd meet other dentists and we'd exchange business cards. We'd both rave about the things we were learning and both claim we'd incorporate these things in our practices. But a couple months later I'd call the dentists and ask how they were doing with the incorporation of what we'd learned. Almost every time I'd hear, "Oh yeah. That's right. I need to get around to doing that."

This is what I've always done and what I recommend to anyone who asks me. When I attend a CE course, that night I sit down and go over my notes. I make out two sheets. One is a list of what my staff needs to order or what they need to do, and in general, I insist that this list be completed by lunch on Monday. The other sheet is a list for myself of what I need to do, and what I need to look for in my patients.

When I get back to the office, I hand my staff their sheet, and I pin my sheet up in front of me at my desk. I also tape a small note, about 2" X 3" right above my desk where I sit - right at eye level. This note reminds me to do whatever it is - and look for whatever I need to look for on patient exams. And I do not remove that note until I am certain that it's become part of my normal routine.

What was your very first job?

Well, as kid I mowed lawns, washed cars - did everything I could to make some spending money - including a paper route.

But my first real job was when I was in the 7th grade. I was a stock boy at C. H. Baker, a woman's shoe store. Because I was too young to legally work, the owner paid me under the table.

What is your business philosophy?

Always do things that I'm proud of and that help other dentists - and as I've said several times already, I believe that what goes around comes around.

How do you stay so motivated?!

Hmmmm. I don't really know. There's nothing I do to intentionally stay motivated. This is all something that I love, and I don't think any of us has to intentionally "try" to stay motivated when it comes to things we love.

Best business decision?

Hmmmm. Two of them: 1) marrying my wife, and 2) becoming a junior partner with Melvin Feiler back in about 1979 or so. My wife isn't just supportive of all that I do, she's a partner, and she is my cheerleader. And my realization that dentistry is not only a "health profession", but a "business" came from Melvin.

Worst business decision?

I wish I could answer this - it's a very easy one to answer. But for certain reasons I'm prevented from even mentioning it.

What do you like best...and least... about your job?

Probably the same as most dentists - I hate dealing with staff issues. It's soooo difficult to find and keep great staff - more so in some areas of the country than others. What I like best - the great feeling when you do something that rocks your patient's world.

Pet peeve?

Wow, I've got a bunch of 'em. Here's one classic - when someone calls and leaves a long, long voicemail message and then leaves their telephone number and speaks as fast as lightening when they give the number and then hang up - so that I have to go back through their long, long message about ten times to try to finish getting the phone number - WHY THE HECK CAN'T PEOPLE JUST SLOW DOWN AND GIVE THEIR NUMBER TWICE!!!! GRRRRRR!!

Most important lesson learned?

Listen to my wife and stop putting trust in others so quickly. I've learned (but not been able to really put into practice) that many people in the business world are not true to their words - too many believe that everything is fair in business. Sorta like the Godfather movies where, just before they shoot you in the head they say, "It's only business, not personal". Though I've learned this over and over, I have a difficult time with this - I tend to trust way too easily - and it's my wife that then steps in and puts feet to the fire.

Person most interested in meeting?

Dead - Jackie Robinson - he overcame so many things and changed the world, and did it with class - real class.
Living - Dr. Gordon Christensen - I met him once but didn't really get much chance to talk. He's been someone I've admired for a long time.
Living and used to be someone I wanted to meet - Dr. Karl Leinfelder - but now I've not only met Karl a few years back, but we've become good friends, and he's just as great of a guy as I'd imagined.

Characteristic most admired?

Being successful and benefiting people at the same time - in other words, elevating yourself by elevating all those around you - and you all go up. Least admired? Greed at the expense of others - in other words, elevating yourself by pushing others down and trying to stand on their shoulders.

Your greatest strength?

Getting others excited about things I'm excited about.
Weakness? I have great difficulty in saying no to people, and that's gotten me into trouble time and time again.

Question you want answered?

What happens next? Where do we go from here?

Most ecstatic moment--wedding day and kids being born doesn't count!?

No contest here. The most ecstatic moment was when our son Chad was about 8 years old and doctors thought he had a brain tumor - my most ecstatic moment was when we found out that he was fine and had no tumor.

A distant second ecstatic moment was when I found that I'd been accepted to dental school.

What would someone be surprised to know about Rod Kurthy?

I used to be one helluva skier. Back then I lifted weights constantly (my dad had been a body builder and had set an international record in the dead lift) and had a 28" waist. And when I skied, man, I flew like lightening. My friends and I used to play a game where the rear skier's goal was to keep the shovel tips of his skis touching the tails of the lead skier's skis, and the lead skier's job was to lose the rear skier. Wow, did that build skill - and resulted in one or two "crash 'n burn's". Back then (late 60's/early 70's) we used LONG skis and there was no such thing as a parabolic ski. That's back when men were made of steel, and ships were made of wood (well, sorta).

Rod, thank you so much for taking the time to enlighten our DCA members, not just with your information but also with your energy!

Yer welcome bud!