I haven’t felt super well lately and being out of work has my sleeping schedule totally messed up. Take this morning, for example, I woke up at 4 AM totally ready to go. Tobyjoe was already awake worrying himself over money. You see we have five birthdays in the month of December, including Tobyjoe’s. We have Christmas, our anniversary, and then my birthday. December and January usually a really rough couple of months. By February, we’re usually poor and cold.
I tried to calm him down about money, saying, “It’s just money! We’ll be fine. Don’t worry about money.” After that, I suggested we get up and go to the gym, a feat we’ve attempted six times since the Great Consumption of 2006 took place last week. We haven’t been to the gym once. (That’s not entirely true; we went on a tour last weekend of Maxim, a local gym in Williamsburg. But that doesn’t really burn much in the way of calories. We even drove there.)
I’m tired, which has me going to bed at 10 PM. And this would be perfectly fantastic if it weren’t for our bed. And that brings me to the point of my writing today, dear Internet, our bed.
Our bed, like, the actual wood that holds everything together is a mere 4-years-old. It’s in perfectly fine shape, however, it’s also perfectly small especially when you throw in two decent-sized humans and three, really fat cats. I can’t tell people enough how absurd our sleeping situation is. Most people nod about it, “Yeah, cats, they can take up like a few inches!” No. These cats, the ones who pretty much own the household, they take up half the bed and we don’t fight them on it. Tobyjoe and I usually sleep on top of one another, legs fall asleep, and arms become totally numb, legs cramp up. It’s awful.
Usually, I deal with it right up until about 3 AM. That’s about the time that I throw a temper tantrum. This includes rapid leg kicks and usually a really bitchy, devilish “uhUH!” or two. Occasionally, I’ll get up in a huff and stomp to the bathroom where I find solace and space atop the toilet seat. I always want to blame Tobyjoe, but it’s not his fault. No. The fault lies on creatures entirely fuzzier.
But, honestly, the bed’s size isn’t my main concern right now. My main concern is with the fact that our mattress is about 3 years past its prime. It’s about six-years-old and we bought it used from Toby’s friend, Matt. Granted, Matt had only had the mattress for a few months but still, it’s used. Twice. Plus, it’s been moved five times, twice across the country. It’s old and it has something against my back, not literally, either.
I’m terrified of bed bugs so that pretty much rules out buying anything from one of those places that picks your old mattress up and drops off the new one in its place. I have shared the subway with other New Yorkers, and while some of them are clean others are some of the dirtiest, grossest people I’ve ever seen. That’s not to say that bed bugs only know the filthy. Recently Maya Rudolph sued her landlord over a bed bug infestation in her 13,500-a-month loft. (The greatest tragedy here isn’t the fact that her baby got some bed bug bites; it’s the fact that someone who can actually afford a 13,500-a-month lease RENTS AT ALL.)
Bed bugs don’t discriminate. And neither do those NYC mattress pick-up/drop-off trucks. Plus, according to the 11 o’clock news, sometimes they sell you used mattresses and tell you they are new. I’m done with used mattresses. I’d rather sleep on the floor.
Last night, I finally had enough of it and demanded we buy a new bed. It’s about damn time, after all. Tobyjoe has been talking about a specific bed for a couple of months now. In fact, the last time he went to San Francisco for business he very nearly almost didn’t come home. We’re looking at buying the bed, the bed apparently better than every other bed in the entire world, the bed that the Westin Hotel actually sells on premises. (Incidentally, I wonder how many of their patrons actually buy the bed after staying there.)
Lately, I have found myself excited over the most mundane things. I got excited while shopping for pillows recently, comforters, and soap. Candles practically have me jumping and clapping. The idea of buying a new bed, and having it delivered, has me gleeful, like it’s holiday and I did something really good for a change.
When I travel for business, I stay at Starwood hotels (usually the W) primarily for that bed.
It’s the most comfortable bed in the universe. It must be.
We have to buy one if only because I want to try it out. :]
I have a cousin who works for Westin, and when we travel back to the Detroit area we have been able to stay at the Westin at DTW for super cheap. I wish my suitcase was big enough to steal that bed. Seriously.
We have been having similar bed/mattress/cat issues, so I feel your pain. Someday, when the money truck arrives, I hope to buy one of those TempurPedic beds. King-size. And maybe a separate one for the cats.
December and January are full months for us as well (Dad’s birthday, mom-in-law’s birthday/giftmas/my birthday three days in a row, then our anniversary and my parents’ anniversary two days in a row. I’m not even including various friends’ birthdays that fall during that timeframe – oy). Hang in there.
Jen, let’s add to it and meet up for dinner sometime this month or next. Thoughts?
I think that sounds fabulous.
I’d say we’d invite you over to sit in our (hopefully) new bed, but that’d be really weird.
Dinner it is!
I’m going to recommend the Tempur-Pedic as well and am willing to forego my birthday and Christmas presents to help make it happen.
What is this Tempur-Pedic you all speak of? is that the one that’s electronic and you can move it up and down?
Here you go
http://www.tempurpedic.com/tempurcmsvb/
One of our friends -Bob the sheep farmer – swears that his recent purchase of one completely eliminated his back problems.
i really like the bedding at modernica/design within reach (they sell the same stuff )
check out the “Case Study” platform bed (i prefer the fastback version), with the medium level mattress. they have a small/medium/large—it depends on how much of it is memory foam, and how much is bedding.
anyways, its super damn comfortable and supportive. they have it in the soho shops on display. you can just walk in and lie on them and feel like you’re in heaven for 15minutes.
Starwood being my main client – I’m inundated with all things Starwood, so let me just say this… The bed IS awesome, but damn expensive. If you want something more reasonable but still awesome, check out the Four Comfort Bed by Four Points. I’ve slept on the W bed, and the Four Points bed as well – and in my opinion both were just as heavenly as the Heavenly bed!
As a side note: The W Bed is cheaper than the Heavenly bed AND they are having a 20% off sale right now…
http://www.whotelsthestore.com
Sleep well kids!
I’m actually saving for a Tempur-Pedic as we speak. I also have friends who swear by them and have experienced relief from back pain. I just hope to jebus that it changes my life in the fabulous ways their advertising says it will.
My parents (who sleep in separate beds because they care more about sleep than cuddling…and I am beginning to see the logic in that) have Sleep Number beds. They seem to like ‘em.
We bought a new mattress last year, and it’s OK. J loves it, but I only think it’s OK. Right after buying it, I wasn’t comfortable. I’ve managed to sleep since, but… It’s not the cushiest mattress ever and I can already feel things poking me.
I see a new mattress in our future. I can’t sleep on this one for much longer.
we bought an Ikea foam mattress recently. it took me a few weeks to get comfortable on it, but now i sleep very well. of course prior we had the crappiest futon-mattress-bastard hybrid in the world so anything would have been an upgrade. it was also one of those purchases we decided to make right then and there immediately on the spot so not much testing of other options. but i don’t like spring mattresses much at all. go foam!
my cousin works for Sealy and i got a great deal on a 1500 dollar pillowtop and box spring! all i can say is, spend as much money as you possibly can on brand name quality….you won’t be disappointed. do some research too.my bed is 14 years old and it’s still great! it is however a double pillow and it can be flipped and is often.
my cousin swears by the “TruForm” by Sealy, it’s the memory foam and i don’t buy it. i sat on one for a while and, no joke, my ass started to sweat! i was thinking, what the F!!!??? this thing doesn’t breath very well, i’d sweat all night! i hate being hot while trying to sleep so that could be a real problem for me especially if i spent that much money!
granted, i have a hot ass naturally and it may not have had anything to do with the bed! hehehehe i’d ask around about how well those things breath before buying
g
You know, I tend to sweat at night as well. And I’d much rather be cold and snuggly over hot and sweaty. Nothing worse.
I have some memory foam but it’s still at my old office. Huge, can’t carry it home too well. now, I’m not sure i want to!
yeah, the cheaper memory foam mattresses suck – its literally sleeping on rubber/plastic.
you need a mattress topper with them.
the pricier ones have a mattress topper built in:
http://www.dwr.com/shop/category.cfm?subc=3833
btw, this is the frame i’m in love with:
http://www.velocityartanddesign.com/mdcs75bed.html
they dont have that model (fastback) at dwr anymore—though they have it at modernica.
I just tried out a tempur-pedic over the holiday. Can’t say I loved it, it was kind of like sleeping on that crunchy green floral foam stuff. Perhaps it hadn’t yet molded to my body yet. Although, it would have been possible to jump on the bed and not spill a glass of red wine balanced on it. maybe that’s not the same brand…
I think you should take your cats with you to go mattress shopping. That way the five of you can attempt to approximate what the real night time experience will be.
Of course, we all know that the bed fungi won’t really cooperate, but the thought of mattress shopping with cats amuses me.
It wont help the cash conversation, but my 2¢ is to save (or stretch) for the tempurpedic. Sleep is (ideally) 1/3rd of our life, for most of us here sitting over a keyboard all day it’s like 1/6th.
You can try em for like 3 months for free, it takes some people a few weeks to get used to sleeping on a surface that doesn’t exert any force back upon your body. And you get a 20 year warranty on a mattresses thats practically indestructible.
When we were considering it they (tempurpedic) sent us a sample block of memory foam about the size of a bar of soap. I keep mine in the bottom of my camera bag (under the heaviest lens or camera) and it’s the greatest impact protection solution i have found. You should try and get a whole bunch of these and make small beds for the kittys.