Summer Quandary
The purchase of a new mattress, a Real Grown-up Bed, with a box spring and everything, has me comparing the relative merits of, say, doing work and being social and reading and exercising etc., versus, well, sleep.
So far my mattress is winning. While I lay there, the summer breeze gently rustling my curtain, my mind is free to wander and wonder such pressing matters as:
- Is there a conspiracy between Big Mattress and Big Linen or is it just bad taste that dictates mattresses be off-white with flower patterns in metallic gold stitching? Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would need or want to worry about owning a “sham” or “bed skirt”.
- What genius at product testing approved the public bathroom tap that requires you to twist and hold the separate hot and cold knobs to get water so that you can only possibly wash one hand in one temperature (always scalding or freezing) at a time?
- Why does a toasted sliced bagel retain so much more heat than regular bread and thus burn your hand without fail as you gingerly attempt to remove it, causing you to yelp in pain and wake up your roommate?
Previously: 52% Formal, 69% Informal, 35% Weird
Subsequently: On This Day
Comments
What I want to know is this: Why is real-people, all-grown-up-now adult bed and linen so frickin’ expensive?
— M-J | Jul. 29, 2003 — 9 AM
Is there some rule that you can no longer sleep on a futon after age 35 or so?
— Kate M. | Jul. 29, 2003 — 2 PM
The only rule I know of is “don’t let your lumpy old futon turn you into a cripple”. Speaking personally, my back has only just barely escaped certain doom.
Also, I concur with M-J: real beds are ludicrously overpriced.
— Luke | Jul. 29, 2003 — 2 PM
Most of the world gets by without huge box springs and mattresses, even in middle age. I always find ‘em too goddamn bouncy after sleeping on a futon all my adult life. YMMV of course.
— Kate M. | Jul. 29, 2003 — 3 PM
What gave it away for me was when I slept on a carpeted floor while visiting a friend and had a better sleep than on my futon. Given that, I suppose I could’ve gone minimalist and just bought a really thick rug…
— Luke | Jul. 29, 2003 — 3 PM
Maybe the gaudy design on the boxspring/mattress combo is like the modern-day version of the pea under the mattress, like in the much-loved fairy tale the Princess and the Pea; in noticing it the real princes and princesses are set apart from the mundane, everyday nobodys.
That being said, I have to agree with you ;)
— adrienne | Jul. 29, 2003 — 9 PM
I think it’s the glaze on the bagels.
— Kate M. | Jul. 30, 2003 — 12 AM
I think it’s the density of the bagels. Store-brand white fluff comes out of the toaster cool. But when you put something in there that’s so heavy that the toaster lever falls to the bottom all by itself, it comes out broiling hot.
— brad | Aug. 1, 2003 — 11 AM
1. The futon, discovered in 1947 at Harvard, is the elementary particle of futility. Its opposite particle is the crouton, the elementary particle of crunchiness.
2. Bagels are actually composed of the same ceramic material that Space Shuttle tiles are.
3. Shams are a sham! Platform beds are where it’s at.
— aj | Aug. 16, 2003 — 5 PM