Thursday and a piece of foam

I have in the past had three major back injuries (two horses and a staircase), and a mattress topper helps. The old one wore out; I bought a new one. Simple.

Not simple. The "memory" foam rubber mattress topper arrived on Thursday in a neat box. But on being opened up, it sprang forth like something alive, trebled in size, and lay blocking  the hallway and looking challenging.

It had to go up two flights of stairs. How hard could that be? A bit of foam....easy. Not easy. Not only was it huge, heavy and unwieldy, but it seemed to take on a life of its own. As we struggled up the two staircases - sometimes me on top; sometimes my new friend - I thought we would never get there. It writhed and bounced and threatened to hurl us  both back over the bannisters. I was determined  to win, not least because I didn't  want our hallway to be forever occupied by a mass of foam rubber.

On our journey, we bumped into furniture, swept books off bookshelves, knocked things over and had several  near misses with the stairs. I heaved and stomped and cursed; the foam merely looked smug. But we got there in the end. The memory foam has certainly given me  much to remember.

Advice to anyone thinking of buying any of this stuff:

1. Buy a bungalow first.
2. If no bungalow, whatever you do, DO NOT remove the memory foam from the box before taking it upstairs. You have been warned.