Sleeping on a water bed – #40thingsbefore40

Have you ever been camping, and woken up in the middle of the night to find your air bed has sprung a slow puncture and your hip is resting gently on the hard ground?

Have you ever been a passenger in a car, where the driver has put his foot down sharply, leaving you feeling slightly queasy?

Now imagine those sensations blended together. Add in a gentle yet disconcerting sloshing sound, drink a bottle of wine, and there you are, on a water bed.

When I was growing up in the 1980s, water beds were the epitome of cool. They were a proper fad – suddenly everyone who was anyone, (i.e. no one I knew), had one, and I longed for one of my own. I imagined it would be amazing, like sleeping on a little boat, bobbing happily along a calm river.

It was not.

I don’t know if it’s all water beds, or just the one that we slept in, but there seemed to be a distinct lack of water. If I sat on the bed on my own, I could feel my bottom touching the hard bottom of the bed. (I do have a big bottom, but even so.)

It probably didn’t help that the bed and breakfast we stayed the night in was a little on the eccentric side. The couple who owned it were lovely, but you can’t help but feel a little on the nervous side when your bedroom door doesn’t lock, and outside on the landing is a shrine to a ghost dog.

shrine to dead dog

Still, as long and uncomfortable as the night may have been, it’s done, another item is checked off my list of 40 things to do before I’m 40. I do still have a few spaces to fill, so if you have any ideas, please let me know! 

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7 Comments

  1. 30 July, 2015 / 1:25 pm

    My friend had an air bed and it was excellent- heated so the bed was always warm (unless it was the hight of summer but I can’t remember if we were just too hot or they turned it off) and we just gently rocked to sleep.
    However, sod that story, I want to know about the fantastically arranged bones of the dog. What the actual?!!!! What does that card say? Where are the other bones?!

    • Jo Middleton
      Author
      30 July, 2015 / 3:57 pm

      I think this one must have been heated too because it did feel sort of warm. That made it worse to be honest as I tend to overheat at night. It was generally NOT everything I dreamed of and more.

  2. Boo Oatham
    30 July, 2015 / 1:45 pm

    Oh man that is seriously weird. Are they really dog bones????? Mind, at least you’ve done the waterbed thing now, maybe I won’t bother if they’re not much to write home about!

  3. Jo Middleton
    Author
    30 July, 2015 / 3:56 pm

    Yep, they were bones alright!! The card said ‘The Ghostly Ben’ and in the visitors’ booklet they had in the rooms there was a big long story about him. It was an interesting read! I should have taken a photo of that too…

  4. 6 August, 2015 / 2:30 am

    That is a weird dog shrine. I had an ex-boyfriend who had a water bed. I thought it was cool since I had never slept on one before. How did you like sleeping on the water bed?

    • Jo Middleton
      Author
      6 August, 2015 / 1:35 pm

      We didn’t really like it at all! How firm was the one you slept in? This one felt like your bum was on the bottom if the other person got out!

      • 7 August, 2015 / 11:29 pm

        :( Maybe yours didn’t have enough water in it. The one I slept in was pretty firm.

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