![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rowynYay! ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sophrani and kagetsume came to visit!
Yay!sophrani and kagetsume came to visit!
Yay!sophrani and kagetsume came to visit!
*spins around until dizzy, falls down*
Sophrani and Kage arrived late Friday night, just after Lut had gone to bed. I'd already made up the futon for them, in hideous but cozy yellow flannel sheets with pears on them. (The design was "pears and leaves", not flowers, as I originally thought.). Kage said he'd rather have had uncomfortable but attractive sheets. I stuck my tongue out at him. Fortunately, Sophrani agreed with me that comfort was more important than appearance on this count.
We stayed up an hour and a half or so, talking and exchanging gifts. Sophrani got me a bottle of raspberry viniagrette from Biltmore Estates (mmm!) and Kage, two boxes of maple sugar candy, both of which I've eaten already. (Mmm!) And they both got me a dehumidifier. Yay! It is, even as I type, busy in my basement, duking it out with my humidfier. No, not really; the humidfier is set to 35% and the dehumidifier to 45%, so they shouldn't be engaged in a death match. (May the best appliance win!) The dehumidifier has been busily sucking water out of the basement air, though. It's got a place where a hose can be attached, so that instead of dehumidfying to a bucket, it'd pour directly into the sump pump. Gotta get a short hose to hook up to it.
Sherri also came on Friday afternoon to dump fill dirt down against the east wall.
Saturday, I made French toast for breakfast, then Kage, Sophrani, and I went out to see the Toy and Miniature museum. (Lut wasn't interested.) The musuem has a whole lot of neat toys (mostly doll houses and furniture, but also a room for model railroads, and one for marbles, and one for the "Gene Mitchell" doll, which is an upscale fashion doll) and miniatures. One of the miniature scenes was of an old-fashioned doctor's office, with all kinds of little pieces of medical equipment in the main room -- a jar full of tongue depressors, tiny scalpel, little bottles of drugs, vials, etc. The back room was the doctor's bedroom. He collected stamps, rather messily -- there was an open stamp book and itty-bitty stamps on the page and falling onto the floor. And a pack of tiny cards. The amount of detail was amazing. We talked about how muchjordangreywolf and boingdragon would've enjoyed it. :)
After a few hours at the museum, we got lunch at a Chinese place nearby, where Kage and I entertained Sophrani by wrestling over the check. ("Give it to me!" "No!" "KHANNNN!") Kage won. Darn his reach.
Then we went to the World Market across the street. This wasn't far from where Lut and I used to live, but it had only been there for a year or so and Lut and I had never been. They had an eclectic selection of foodstuff, toys, and home furnishings, mostly in styles from assorted other parts of the world. They carried maple sugar candy, so now I know where to get more, having run out again already. Stuff doesn't last long around me. :9 They had a portable kitchen island which was a good size and shape for my kitchen, but they only had it in blond wood, and my kitchen cabinets and paneling are all dark, so it would've clashed. I'll probably go back in a few months and see if dark wood has come back in style yet. :)
After the World Market trip, we hit the supermarket for Coke and other staples, then went home, toting Chinese food (by now unfortunately cold) for Lut. It had started raining, rather hard, by the time we left World Market, and the leaky areas of the basement had (once again) puddled up. So the fill dirt hasn't made much difference, at least so far. It may be that Sherri didn't use enough -- she works mostly with planting, not construction, so she probably hasn't done much grading work.
I took a nap, and when I got up, spent a couple of hours chatting with Sophrani and Kage and playing with hair. I eventually did them both up with elf braids, then we scooted off to dinner before the sushi place closed for the night. We arrived too late for the sushi train to still be running, so we sat at a table, ordered off the menu, and ate much sushi anyway. Except for Kage, who is weird and doesn't like sushi. He had beef teriyaki instead. This time we did not actually duel for the check -- I was in the bathroom when it arrived, and he had grabbed it by default. However, he kindly conceded it to me after I asked politely for it, um, two or three times.
Once we got home, we collapsed on the futon. We talked a bit but I was half asleep, and a couple of hours later, I dragged myself back to bed.
Sunday morning, more time chatting and playing with hair. (Whee! Hair!) We all went to the Cheesecake Factory for brunch -- Lut and Sophrani ordered breakfast items, Kage and I ordered lunch items, and we all got cheesecake. I tried their new Godiva chocolate cheesecake, which was pretty good, but not the best I've gotten there. Chocolate is good for many things, but cheesecake goes better with other flavors, methinks. This time, the waiter brought the check directly to me (mwahaha!) but I let Kage get it, since he'd been so good about sushi the night before. (What with all the cheesecake, brunch actually came to a bit more than dinner had, in fact.)
Last, we went to Home Depot. Since we were near the one we used to live by, we went there, instead of the one closer to our new home. Alas, this one did not have a section marked, in giant stenciled letters, with the word "CAULK". I went to the bathroom while the others prowled the general area of the paint, looking for it, and then through the rest of the store, finding various spots where bathroom caulk and other caulk-gun products lurked, but I really wanted something I could slather on in large quantities, given the size of the area I've got problems in, and the absence of obvious cracks in much of it. This is the last stab I'll be taking at a cheap fix; if this doesn't cut it, I'll start calling professionals, and probably get something like a French drain put in.
Anyway, we found many other things that we just couldn't live without, but not caulk. We'd decided to ask for directions (gasp!) but then couldn't find an orange-aproned person to ask. While looking for a sales clerk, we stumbled upon th caulk instead. (It was -- naturally! -- with the paint -- but right in the middle, with paint on one side of it and more paint on the other side.) We wound up picking out some fast-setting concrete sealant that billed itself as "stops active leaks!" and for use in basements and swimming pools, so that looked promising. I also got a can of paint-on sealant (billed as "guaranteed to prevent leaks!"), with the notion that I'd trowel on the concrete stuff, let it set, then paint over it with a few layers of the other stuff, and hope for the best. I'll see how it goes; doesn't seem like it should hurt much, in any case. I'm not worried about foundation damage from the water, in fact; my inspector was not confident that the basement didn't have water problems, but he was confident that the foundation was sound. ("If the house was going to slide off its foundation, it would have by now.") The water problem I have now has probably been there since the place was built, and as annoying as it is, I doubt it'll be doing long-term damage to the house itself. I still want to fix it, of course -- but I'm not going to panic over it.
When we got home, we set about moving the futon into the basement. The futon frame is surprisingly worse for wear -- the base board is splintering where the futon slides against when it's pulled out. O.o It is warranteed for life, as I recall, but I'm not sure I care enough to drag the thing back to the store. I dunno. Maybe I'll give them a call and ask about it. I could disassemble it and take back just the splintering baseboard. Or not worry about it; it's not visible and not extensive enough to represent structural damage yet, anyway. (The stain has flaked off and the wood ground down a little, not cracking or splitting or anything dramatic.) Moving the futon down was pretty straight forward -- we moved the mattress down last, and the frame down in the two pieces easiset to seperate. Had to shuffle a few things around in the basement at the last moment to make room, but nothing like the chore that moving the couch had been.
Then we went to get the couch. Lut moved his car, then he and Kage dragged the sofa from the garage. From there, Kage pushed the sofa onto one arm and we shoved the hand truck onto it. We secured the sofa snuggly to it with the ratcheting tie-downs we'd bought for just this purpose. Then Kage tilted the hand truck back.
And one of the tires on the hand truck promptly deflated. Completely.
We don't have a bicycle pump. After some debate over what to do next, we decided to try having all four of us carry the sofa in, one person on each corner.
Past experience from having more than two people try to move something has not been good for me. I expected all the weight and awkwardness to end up on the two guys, while Sophrani and I trailed along ineffectually attempting to shoulder some of the load.
In fact, it worked perfectly, with all of us helping and no one having any trouble holding up their corner. The contrast between Lut and I struggling to move this think on our own, and the four of us doing it together, was frightening. But having one person on each corner made it not only lighter, but also a lot less awkward than one person trying to get a grip on two sides 30 inches apart, where one side weighs twice what the other does. Toughest part was getting it through the front door, and even that Kage and Lut handled easily enough. (It had to be turned sideways for that, and at that point more than two people really didn't help -- nowhere to grip).
I danced around like Rocky on the at the top of the steps once we got it back in place. Hurray!
Kage and Sophrani moved their stuff out to the car, but it wasn't that late yet, so they stayed around a while longer to chat. I tried a few more different hair styles on Sophrani, including a couple to braid back her bangs. She's trying to grow them out now, and they're at the "long enough to be annoying, not long enough to brush back" stage now. Neither of us much liked the look if they were French-braided into the rest of her hair, though. My final attempt left the bangs loose, and had a French braid circling from the nape of her neck, across her forehead, and down the far side. From there, I turned it into a standard braid and bobby-pinned it across the remaining loose hair going down the back of her neck, and into the braid on the far side. Looked pretty cool.
Then they had to go. (Sniffle!) But it was a good visit. Yay! Hopefully I'll get a chance to go out and see them again soon. Maybe late spring, after I visitstrangess. (I'm a-comin', Strangess! Probably for several days in late March; I've got it down on the vacation schedule, and as long as they don't reject my request to split my two weeks of vacation up, it should work fine.)
sophrani and kagetsume came to visit! Yay!
sophrani and kagetsume came to visit! Yay!
sophrani and kagetsume came to visit!*spins around until dizzy, falls down*
Sophrani and Kage arrived late Friday night, just after Lut had gone to bed. I'd already made up the futon for them, in hideous but cozy yellow flannel sheets with pears on them. (The design was "pears and leaves", not flowers, as I originally thought.). Kage said he'd rather have had uncomfortable but attractive sheets. I stuck my tongue out at him. Fortunately, Sophrani agreed with me that comfort was more important than appearance on this count.
We stayed up an hour and a half or so, talking and exchanging gifts. Sophrani got me a bottle of raspberry viniagrette from Biltmore Estates (mmm!) and Kage, two boxes of maple sugar candy, both of which I've eaten already. (Mmm!) And they both got me a dehumidifier. Yay! It is, even as I type, busy in my basement, duking it out with my humidfier. No, not really; the humidfier is set to 35% and the dehumidifier to 45%, so they shouldn't be engaged in a death match. (May the best appliance win!) The dehumidifier has been busily sucking water out of the basement air, though. It's got a place where a hose can be attached, so that instead of dehumidfying to a bucket, it'd pour directly into the sump pump. Gotta get a short hose to hook up to it.
Sherri also came on Friday afternoon to dump fill dirt down against the east wall.
Saturday, I made French toast for breakfast, then Kage, Sophrani, and I went out to see the Toy and Miniature museum. (Lut wasn't interested.) The musuem has a whole lot of neat toys (mostly doll houses and furniture, but also a room for model railroads, and one for marbles, and one for the "Gene Mitchell" doll, which is an upscale fashion doll) and miniatures. One of the miniature scenes was of an old-fashioned doctor's office, with all kinds of little pieces of medical equipment in the main room -- a jar full of tongue depressors, tiny scalpel, little bottles of drugs, vials, etc. The back room was the doctor's bedroom. He collected stamps, rather messily -- there was an open stamp book and itty-bitty stamps on the page and falling onto the floor. And a pack of tiny cards. The amount of detail was amazing. We talked about how much
jordangreywolf and boingdragon would've enjoyed it. :)After a few hours at the museum, we got lunch at a Chinese place nearby, where Kage and I entertained Sophrani by wrestling over the check. ("Give it to me!" "No!" "KHANNNN!") Kage won. Darn his reach.
Then we went to the World Market across the street. This wasn't far from where Lut and I used to live, but it had only been there for a year or so and Lut and I had never been. They had an eclectic selection of foodstuff, toys, and home furnishings, mostly in styles from assorted other parts of the world. They carried maple sugar candy, so now I know where to get more, having run out again already. Stuff doesn't last long around me. :9 They had a portable kitchen island which was a good size and shape for my kitchen, but they only had it in blond wood, and my kitchen cabinets and paneling are all dark, so it would've clashed. I'll probably go back in a few months and see if dark wood has come back in style yet. :)
After the World Market trip, we hit the supermarket for Coke and other staples, then went home, toting Chinese food (by now unfortunately cold) for Lut. It had started raining, rather hard, by the time we left World Market, and the leaky areas of the basement had (once again) puddled up. So the fill dirt hasn't made much difference, at least so far. It may be that Sherri didn't use enough -- she works mostly with planting, not construction, so she probably hasn't done much grading work.
I took a nap, and when I got up, spent a couple of hours chatting with Sophrani and Kage and playing with hair. I eventually did them both up with elf braids, then we scooted off to dinner before the sushi place closed for the night. We arrived too late for the sushi train to still be running, so we sat at a table, ordered off the menu, and ate much sushi anyway. Except for Kage, who is weird and doesn't like sushi. He had beef teriyaki instead. This time we did not actually duel for the check -- I was in the bathroom when it arrived, and he had grabbed it by default. However, he kindly conceded it to me after I asked politely for it, um, two or three times.
Once we got home, we collapsed on the futon. We talked a bit but I was half asleep, and a couple of hours later, I dragged myself back to bed.
Sunday morning, more time chatting and playing with hair. (Whee! Hair!) We all went to the Cheesecake Factory for brunch -- Lut and Sophrani ordered breakfast items, Kage and I ordered lunch items, and we all got cheesecake. I tried their new Godiva chocolate cheesecake, which was pretty good, but not the best I've gotten there. Chocolate is good for many things, but cheesecake goes better with other flavors, methinks. This time, the waiter brought the check directly to me (mwahaha!) but I let Kage get it, since he'd been so good about sushi the night before. (What with all the cheesecake, brunch actually came to a bit more than dinner had, in fact.)
Last, we went to Home Depot. Since we were near the one we used to live by, we went there, instead of the one closer to our new home. Alas, this one did not have a section marked, in giant stenciled letters, with the word "CAULK". I went to the bathroom while the others prowled the general area of the paint, looking for it, and then through the rest of the store, finding various spots where bathroom caulk and other caulk-gun products lurked, but I really wanted something I could slather on in large quantities, given the size of the area I've got problems in, and the absence of obvious cracks in much of it. This is the last stab I'll be taking at a cheap fix; if this doesn't cut it, I'll start calling professionals, and probably get something like a French drain put in.
Anyway, we found many other things that we just couldn't live without, but not caulk. We'd decided to ask for directions (gasp!) but then couldn't find an orange-aproned person to ask. While looking for a sales clerk, we stumbled upon th caulk instead. (It was -- naturally! -- with the paint -- but right in the middle, with paint on one side of it and more paint on the other side.) We wound up picking out some fast-setting concrete sealant that billed itself as "stops active leaks!" and for use in basements and swimming pools, so that looked promising. I also got a can of paint-on sealant (billed as "guaranteed to prevent leaks!"), with the notion that I'd trowel on the concrete stuff, let it set, then paint over it with a few layers of the other stuff, and hope for the best. I'll see how it goes; doesn't seem like it should hurt much, in any case. I'm not worried about foundation damage from the water, in fact; my inspector was not confident that the basement didn't have water problems, but he was confident that the foundation was sound. ("If the house was going to slide off its foundation, it would have by now.") The water problem I have now has probably been there since the place was built, and as annoying as it is, I doubt it'll be doing long-term damage to the house itself. I still want to fix it, of course -- but I'm not going to panic over it.
When we got home, we set about moving the futon into the basement. The futon frame is surprisingly worse for wear -- the base board is splintering where the futon slides against when it's pulled out. O.o It is warranteed for life, as I recall, but I'm not sure I care enough to drag the thing back to the store. I dunno. Maybe I'll give them a call and ask about it. I could disassemble it and take back just the splintering baseboard. Or not worry about it; it's not visible and not extensive enough to represent structural damage yet, anyway. (The stain has flaked off and the wood ground down a little, not cracking or splitting or anything dramatic.) Moving the futon down was pretty straight forward -- we moved the mattress down last, and the frame down in the two pieces easiset to seperate. Had to shuffle a few things around in the basement at the last moment to make room, but nothing like the chore that moving the couch had been.
Then we went to get the couch. Lut moved his car, then he and Kage dragged the sofa from the garage. From there, Kage pushed the sofa onto one arm and we shoved the hand truck onto it. We secured the sofa snuggly to it with the ratcheting tie-downs we'd bought for just this purpose. Then Kage tilted the hand truck back.
And one of the tires on the hand truck promptly deflated. Completely.
We don't have a bicycle pump. After some debate over what to do next, we decided to try having all four of us carry the sofa in, one person on each corner.
Past experience from having more than two people try to move something has not been good for me. I expected all the weight and awkwardness to end up on the two guys, while Sophrani and I trailed along ineffectually attempting to shoulder some of the load.
In fact, it worked perfectly, with all of us helping and no one having any trouble holding up their corner. The contrast between Lut and I struggling to move this think on our own, and the four of us doing it together, was frightening. But having one person on each corner made it not only lighter, but also a lot less awkward than one person trying to get a grip on two sides 30 inches apart, where one side weighs twice what the other does. Toughest part was getting it through the front door, and even that Kage and Lut handled easily enough. (It had to be turned sideways for that, and at that point more than two people really didn't help -- nowhere to grip).
I danced around like Rocky on the at the top of the steps once we got it back in place. Hurray!
Kage and Sophrani moved their stuff out to the car, but it wasn't that late yet, so they stayed around a while longer to chat. I tried a few more different hair styles on Sophrani, including a couple to braid back her bangs. She's trying to grow them out now, and they're at the "long enough to be annoying, not long enough to brush back" stage now. Neither of us much liked the look if they were French-braided into the rest of her hair, though. My final attempt left the bangs loose, and had a French braid circling from the nape of her neck, across her forehead, and down the far side. From there, I turned it into a standard braid and bobby-pinned it across the remaining loose hair going down the back of her neck, and into the braid on the far side. Looked pretty cool.
Then they had to go. (Sniffle!) But it was a good visit. Yay! Hopefully I'll get a chance to go out and see them again soon. Maybe late spring, after I visit
strangess. (I'm a-comin', Strangess! Probably for several days in late March; I've got it down on the vacation schedule, and as long as they don't reject my request to split my two weeks of vacation up, it should work fine.)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2003-12-28 08:28 pm (UTC)Oooo. Maple sugar candy. I haven't had that for ... uh ... years. Possibly a decade. No, easily a decade. Forgot it existed. I'll have to hunt some down sometime. =9 (Trying to remember the name of the Amish-affiliated candy/sausage/cheese makers in Iowa who would make decadent maple candy offerings pressed into interesting little shapes, and offer them in gift packages around Christmas time.)
That toy and miniatures museum does sound like the sort of thing I'd enjoy seeing. So cool! =D Although what I'd REALLY want to find out is "How did they do it?" You know, pick up techniques and all that. ;)
And it's nice to know that you have a Cheesecake Factory up there, too. I rather like the one down here. (Well, there's a second one, at the top of DisneyQuest, but it's not a full-blown restaurant.) I don't, incidentally - ironically? - like cheesecake, but Gwendel does, and I like their other bakery offerings, and their taste in decor. =)
no subject
Date: 2003-12-29 08:18 am (UTC)Y'know, I had thought of that when I was typing this up, in fact. But even though I basically supported the war and remain unimpressed by the reaction of French leadership in general, I still think the whole "anti-French" backlash was way overblown. I mean, people are allowed to disagree with me and not become my enemies for life. ;)
I must admit, there seems to be an equally unjustified amount of "anti-American" backlash, abroad and in the US itself, that doesn't make me happy, either. Even if I took the position that the Iraq war was a terrible and unjustified action, that wouldn't make America a bad country or its people evil. Still, it hardly advances the cause of civility if I say "Well, they're doing it to me, so I should do it right back to them!" And, hey, who is this "they", anyway?
Oh, and I'm just musing aloud -- I know you didn't mean me to take that seriously. :)
I wish they'd had miniature-making tips, too -- I'm sure you'd've been fascinated. :)
no subject
Date: 2003-12-29 08:30 am (UTC)All the same, I had a craving for French toast this morning. (Didn't have any, but I'll have to make some up sometime. And I won't call it "Freedom Toast"! Not unless I'm being silly. ;) )
no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 08:13 am (UTC)So ... didja have French toast *this* morning? :)
no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 08:25 am (UTC)Insofar as headscarves and modesty, I've heard someone else use the "no shirts" parallel. And I could almost imagine it happening in France, too, sometimes. =P I'm sure someone could argue that the idea of nudity being objectionable is obviously a RELIGIOUS imposition. But just where does the line get drawn about where "religion" ends and "culture" begins? What's Christian about a Christmas tree, or Santa Claus, or Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, for example?
I don't see headscarves as a *symbol* of religion - I mean, Muslim MEN don't wear headscarves, right?
Basically, it boils down to this: practicing Muslim women will be discouraged from seeking education - they will either have to give up the education (by refusing to get rid of their headscarves in order to go to school), or else they'll have to compromise on the "practicing Muslim" part in order to get that education.
I've got a lot of problems with Islam, but I've got even more of a problem with a political stunt like this. =P
no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 12:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 01:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-29 03:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 07:48 am (UTC)Advice on check battles
Date: 2003-12-29 06:52 am (UTC)Re: Advice on check battles
Date: 2003-12-29 08:09 am (UTC)I'll have to remember that for next time. :> (Of course, I'm giving up whatever advantage I might've gained by posting this where Kagetsume will probably see it, but, oh well.)
Re: Advice on check battles
Date: 2003-12-29 12:39 pm (UTC)Amusingly, I seem to be the recipient regardless of the number of folks at the table. I just look like the bill payer, perhaps. ];-)
We have an arrangement with a number of friends; we will obtaine a card and pass it back and forth between couples. Whoever has the card gets to pay for dinner. The card is usually connected in some way to the relationship: in one case, we have for years used a used-up Osaka subway station card. The method prevents arguments and hurt feelings -- and impromptu contests of strength.
===|==============/ Level Head
Re: Advice on check battles
Date: 2003-12-30 07:47 am (UTC)Diner's Club, maybe. ;)
no subject
Date: 2003-12-29 08:25 am (UTC)It has been my experience (real with cots, vicarious with queen-size airbeds) that the manufacturers seem to think that weight limits are for one night, rather than years. [My usage of cots is due to two things: being nice to my back, and having more important uses for floor space than a bed. The airbed misadventures were due to cashflow management issues.]
For perspective: I managed to destroy a Coleman® cot in two weeks [May 2002] by routine use, in spite of being more than 10 lbs under its rated weight limit. It was in "desperate condition" in only two (the frame was visibly bent!).
No need for refund: I reused the Coleman's pad on its two successors from Byer of Maine. These are rated for 100 lbs more than the Coleman. The first successor, an aluminum-framed wonder, was structurally sound -- but aluminum ages under constant mechanical stress :( I sheared the bolts in eight months of normal use [Jan 2003] to put it in "desperate condition". [The slightest mistake in getting in, or out, and it fell to pieces.] I used it for eight more months before a spring-leg tore through the frame in Sept 2003, making it incapable of supporting my weight.
The second successor is hardwood and steel (with the same kind of springy legs). It dates from Sept. 2003 (bought it two days after the aluminum-frame deceased).
While I have been advised that I will get better value from an iron-framed cot, they are hard to find on the open market at a competitive price and locale.
no subject
Date: 2003-12-29 08:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-29 10:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 08:07 am (UTC)Anyway, we've been using it roughly weekly for the last two summers, and the frame has shown no problems. There's a small sign of stress on one side, where Lut sat for most of the first summer. But we switched which seat we sat in and the other one has had no problems.
These were no more expensive than the metal folding chairs I've seen; I think the two-seater was between $20 and $30, and the individuals were $10-$20. Anyway, you might try one of those the next time one of your current chairs gives up the ghost. If you're short on storage space, you might even talk one of your players into storing and bringing his own chair. ;)
no subject
Date: 2003-12-30 07:57 am (UTC)From the pattern of the damage -- two scraped spots where the main supports of the futon frame rest against the baseboard -- I would say that the damage wasn't from sleeping on it, but from the futon base being slid between "couch" and "bed" modes. There's a little extra friction, too, because the base is knocked in and tugged out to "lock" and "unlock" it from position. I'm thinking of using some wood filler we'd bought anyway (for a different task) on the spots, and then covering the spots with a little piece of vinyl or even contact paper -- just something that'll weather the back-and-forth sliding better than plain wood.
Your cot trials are rather interesting -- I'll have to remember that if I ever get a cot for long term use. :)