Bed bitch and beyond

It takes a lot to talk me into a bed. Well, into buying a bed. I'm picky. If furniture stores had softer lighting, martinis, and told me I have nice eyes, I think everyone involved would feel much better about themselves the next day.

My mother arrived last weekend and announced we were going shopping for a bed for my guest room. Her treat. In her words, "Mommy's tired of sleeping on the couch." Since the spare room decor consists primarily of two years' worth of magazines, a dilapidated scratching post, and a jacuzzi attachment that has very likely bubbled its last, she didn't have to tell me twice.

Beds are effin' expensive. Pound for pound, they've got to be worse than cereal. I kind of knew this going in, but wow. And most of the beds on the market are either massive or really ugly. Some are really massively ugly. Do people just like to stretch out, or is every second bed purchaser planning on group sex? Because there were some beds I'm pretty sure were a hoop and a groupie away from being part of the Wilt Chamberlain collection.

And size aside, the frames are not stylistically superb. A lot of towering wood, which, in different circumstances, I'm very much for, lovely but far too colossal for my little house. Lots of mediocre metal (just like the 80s), a cute one in the wrong colour, and a gold one so blindingly trashy I was worried for my reputation (also just like the 80s). I eliminated any bed that required a) a step ladder; b) a polygamous marriage; c) a complete lack of taste on my part. Okay - we're whittling. I knew I wanted white or cream. Nothing with too high a headboard. This left me with exactly 3 options. One that was a bit too Miss Havisham, one that was a bit too finial-y, and the one I settled on, a lovely cream sleigh bed. I felt a bit like Goldilocks, if Goldilocks had been trailed around a store by her increasingly exasperated mother, who kept threatening to count to ten and muttering about the "limited time offer".

Mattresses. Did you know you can get a "mix and match" set, which means the fabrics on your box spring and mattress may differ, for about half the price? Seriously - they're covered in sheets; who cares if they don't match? I have no first hand knowledge of this, but I used to get HBO, and I'm pretty sure the people whose beds are most often stripped bare for the world to see are meth heads, and I'm not convinced a mismatched mattress set is their biggest problem. Teeth might be their biggest problem. And a word to the wise: asking a recently retired woman with a fake knee to roll around on a bed, in public, to test its suitability will push the limits of matriarchal good will.

I ultimately settled on a plush mattress, low profile box spring, and the "Juliette" frame. I worried that the bed might come off as too feminine, but then I remembered one very important truth: god willing, if a gentleman caller has made it to the second floor, he's not sleeping in the guest room.