This Town is Awesome... In Bed

By: Brent Runyon, November 7, 2011

- Brent Runyon is an acclaimed novelist and reporter for the Falmouth Enterprise.

I’m so excited about the newest store in downtown Falmouth, the one that went where the old Blockbuster Video was. The most recent addition to Falmouth’s lovely commercial district sells what every resident needs more than anything. 1-800-MATRESS(es)!

Hurray! Another mattress store! I wasn’t happy with the selection at the four other mattress stores on the main drag. I felt that what the town really needed was another store solely devoted to selling mattresses and mattress-related products.

Of course, some might say that the four existing mattress stores were enough, but that’s taking the short view. Think about it. You need to buy a new mattress every 10 years or so. That’s an incredibly important purchase. You’re going to want to shop around.

As the mattress salesmen will tell you when you go mattress shopping, you spend a third of your life in bed, more if you’re lucky—wink, wink. That was a joke about sex, which is one of the things that people do in bed, in addition to sleeping.

People also read in bed – sometimes. But in Falmouth we have only one bookstore, so getting a book to read is not that easy. If you want a specific book you either have to order it special from the only bookstore in town or go to the libraries, which are not open for as long as they used to be.

Of course, you can also order a book from some website, or through an “app” on your phone or computer.

The other thing you can buy on your phone is music. It’s great to be able to order music on the phone. It’s so much better than going into a store and browsing through the rows and rows of CDs and records. I’m so glad our downtowns aren’t dragged down with a single place to buy a CD anymore.

We used to be able to walk down Main Street and stop into the CD store and chat it up with the clerk behind the counter. That person would give us advice on what music we might like. That sucked. I’m so glad we get to ignore everyone and stare at our phones with headphones on like New York City hipsters.

Oh yeah, you can also watch movies on your phone! That’s probably why Blockbuster Video closed: people get movies through the mail and those little automated kiosks inside grocery stores. Thank God I don’t have to go into video stores anymore, because there aren’t any!

Maybe all those stores closed because people spend so much of their time in bed.

That reminds me of another joke. It involves Chinese food. You know when you open a fortune cookie at the end of the meal and you read it aloud to your family and friends. I think it’s really funny to say the words “in bed” at the end of the fortune cookie saying.

So, if the fortune cookie reads, “Don’t be pushed by your problems. Be led by your dreams,” wait a sec and say -  “in bed.”

It’s hilarious. Everyone will laugh because they know you are making a sex joke.

I love jokes. Especially jokes about beds.

Maybe, if we're lucky, someday Falmouth will be made up of nothing but Chinese restaurants and mattress stores. Of course, we will also need a few places to buy our cell phones so we can continue to enjoy our books and music and movies – wait for it –  IN BED!