The answer keeps slipping away from me
One thing I got caught on during my watch of Babylon 5's pilot yesterday... at one point, Sinclair's girlfriend mentions that she bought "frictionless bedsheets". Which seemed ridiculous to me at the time, but is an idea my brain just won't let go of.
I tried to imagine how you get into bed in a way that doesn't involve either sliding right across the bed and falling off the far side or missing the landing and just falling off the side you're getting in from...
But then I wonder how you even make the bed. I guess if the frictionless surface is only on one side you could just grip it from beneath, though once you got it over the corners of the mattress there's no way to straighten it out. Try to tug on the sides and it just slips through your fingers. Try to smooth out any wrinkles on top and if you aren't keeping yourself steadied, your hand goes flying out from under you and if you're lucky, you just land face down on the mattress and stay there. Otherwise you plunk face down on the mattress and then keep sliding in the opposite direction you were trying to smooth the sheet until you fall off the bed.
All of which is hilariously moot because even if you overcome all of that and get on the bed with your partner without either one of you bruising your coccyx on the way, all it takes is one good thrust and your partner's head is going through the headboard. I can't imagine that being anything but a mood killer for most people.
Seriously. Frictionless bedsheets? Of all the bizarre, pointless "futuristic" gizmos I've heard about in a lifetime of science fiction, that has to be one of the worst.
I tried to imagine how you get into bed in a way that doesn't involve either sliding right across the bed and falling off the far side or missing the landing and just falling off the side you're getting in from...
But then I wonder how you even make the bed. I guess if the frictionless surface is only on one side you could just grip it from beneath, though once you got it over the corners of the mattress there's no way to straighten it out. Try to tug on the sides and it just slips through your fingers. Try to smooth out any wrinkles on top and if you aren't keeping yourself steadied, your hand goes flying out from under you and if you're lucky, you just land face down on the mattress and stay there. Otherwise you plunk face down on the mattress and then keep sliding in the opposite direction you were trying to smooth the sheet until you fall off the bed.
All of which is hilariously moot because even if you overcome all of that and get on the bed with your partner without either one of you bruising your coccyx on the way, all it takes is one good thrust and your partner's head is going through the headboard. I can't imagine that being anything but a mood killer for most people.
Seriously. Frictionless bedsheets? Of all the bizarre, pointless "futuristic" gizmos I've heard about in a lifetime of science fiction, that has to be one of the worst.