The Great Bed Farce

We have suffered for years with a double bed, two adults and a very needy cat (who manages to steal half the bed leaving us hanging of the edge).

Enough, we thought, time to buy ourselves a King sized bed, so off we go round the showrooms, spending the best part of an hour testing mattresses (jumping on them, rolling over them, bouncing up and down on them and generally making the staff worry what we were up to), then choosing a really nice bedstead, hurrah all set so we think.

The bed arrived on Valentines Day (yup gonna test drive this puppy), so off I set with spanners and screwdrivers in hand to build the “30 minute” bed following the simplest instructions. 3 hours later and it was built, but oh there is a slight problem, the inside metal frame is 1inch narrower than the bed frame, making it impossible to fit properly, that coupled with the fact that it is rusty doesn’t make for a good start. Undeterred I placed the 4 tonne Kingsize mattress on the bed to check it out and see of there were any other problems, oh boy!

It would appear that our Kingsize (standard size) mattress, is actually 6 inches shorter than our Kingsize (standard size) bed, leaving a massive and quite frankly dangerous gap. So off to the showroom I pop, tape measure in hand and low and behold their bed had the exact same gap, WHY? Now for those of you used to British Customer Service, you can guess the response:

“Ah sir (says the manager through gritted teeth, when what she means is stop bothering me), all Kingsize mattresses are that short, it allows you to tuck in your duvet covers, plus which a pocket sprung mattress will collapse over a few months and fill the gap”

Right, so all beds are made too long and all mattresses need 6 inches to tuck a duvet in, plus a “pocket sprung mattress” guaranteed for 10 years not to collaps or lose the shape, will collapse to fill a 6 inch gap in a period of months. I don’t think so!!!!

After scouring countless stores, it would appear that only this one company, with it’s own range of beds suffer this problem. My guess is that this a set of beds built by foreign labour with a knackered old tape measure and now they haveĀ  to “flog em off” as fast as they can to unsuspecting punters. Not us though, the bed is going back and we are getting our money back (good job really cos we went and bought a proper bed from a lovelly little pine warehouse).

And now, we have a little bit of bed each, but the cat still manages to steal most of it during the night (little git).

So Valentines Day was spent on our blow up airbed from camping, romantic or not.

P.S Don’t ever try carrying a Kingsize headboard and footboard in a Suzuki jeep, it just aint big enough, you scrape your knuckles on the corners and really struggle to drive properly.

Hello and Welcome

Well hello from the new and improved Our One Big Adventure website.

It has been a while since we managed any updates, but we is on a roll now (hopefully anyhoo).

So 2008 was a wonderful start, I suddenly became an adult, well a child in a man’s body anyway, celebrating the anniversary of my 39th birthday only in the style that we can, back in St.Lucia for a glorious period of time. every day consisted of 3 solid meals, wine with lunch, cocktails during the day and champagne at night.

Lorna (the most wonderful wife ever) had booked a helicopter transport from the Airport in St.Lucia to the hotel as a surprise, along with a days sailing, searching for whales, snorkling and champagne at the sunset. We stopped again at the East Winds Inn, which I have to say is second to no other hotel for service and food quality. On the way over I was forced to wear an 8inch badge with flashing lights on it, which got a few giggles and plenty of alcohol from the cabin crew.

Back down to earth now and Lorna is now the Head of IT (no surprise there really, she is good at what she does) and we are enjoying time in a little village in Yorkshire (it does not compare to the wonderful cottage in Wales where we spent a year). Thanks to the Barty’s for the calendar with the most wonderful views from our old property (brings back so many good memories).

And now we are busy planning the summer vacation (ooo yes), with a visit to Vegas and a road trip with the Folks from over in that there Ireland.

Plenty of things happening to keep us busy at the moment, learning to play cribbage (or being shown and forgetting the rules immediately, thanks Stu & Jen). I’m learning to ride a real motorbike instead of a twist and go, so if you see me on the road, better leave a lot of room, still struggling with gears at the moment.