Furniture Spam: A Short Story

Image credit: Flickr user Greenkozi, Creative Commons

Earlier today, me and a couple of my friends made a trip out to the friendly neighborhood monolith of vaguely Scandinavian furniture to partake of the suspiciously cheap breakfasts they offer in their cafeteria and pick up some miscellaneous housewares.  While we were there, we saw that they were running some sort of event where you could get entered into a drawing for either a gift card or the ever vague “other prizes” by signing up for their mailing list.  After all, when you get a chance to get your inbox spammed for the next eternity or two in exchange for a longshot chance at a $250 furniture shopping spree, you’ve got to take it, right?  Then again, when me and my friends get together, we have a tendency to take these things to the most illogical and absurd conclusions we can possibly think of…

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Thanks to the ridiculously cheap alarm clock that failed to go off for the third time this week, Ed was running late for an important meeting at work.  After hastily putting on the first three socially acceptable items that came out of the dresser drawer and halfheartedly combing his hair into something that bore a passing resemblance to a part, he quickly rushed down the stairs.  If he hurried, he might still have a chance of getting there on time.  After grabbing some frozen thing out of the freezer for lunch and shoving it into his bag, he quickly made his way to the door, opened it…  and stopped dead in his tracks.

It had happened again.  Why did it have to be today, of all days?

There, sitting on the front lawn, was a trendy new sofa, complete with matching loveseat.  Between these was a rather lovely little side table with a nice lamp, and a well-coordinated area rug tied the whole set into a coheisive group.  It was immediately apparent that someone had carefully selected these items to coordinate with each other and to compliment just about any room, and the overall effect made for a cozy little gathering place  that the whole family could enjoy.  On top of the loveseat, a colorful flyer helpfully suggested some coffee tables and shelves that might coordinate well with this grouping, and even provided some valuable coupons.  Not that Ed really had much use for the coupons in the first place, since a number of bookshelves had already appeared on the front porch just a couple of months ago, and one of the entertainment centers highlighted on the flyer was already occupying a considerable portion of his garage.

In fact, ever since the fateful day a few months before when Ed put his name and address into a drawing at the big-box furniture store and somehow managed to end up winning the grand prize, this type of thing had become a rather common occurrence.  The sign on the entry box had informed him that he could win free furniture or other great prizes, but there didn’t seem to be a whole lot of details there.  Surely if he had bothered to read the fine print he might have figured out what he was getting himself into, but at the time they were offering the meatball combo in the cafeteria for a dollar off the regular price, and he was too hungry to bother with such trivial things.  Maybe if he had stuck around for the drawing he might have been able to figure out what was going on, but he had too many other errands to run that day and had to leave quickly after lunch.  So it wasn’t until furniture started randomly showing up on his doorstep one day that he even had any idea what was going on.

At first, the whole thing was kind of amusing.  He would walk out to collect the mail and find a brand new set of pots, pans and dishes sitting at the doorstep.  Upon returning from an evening out he might find that his parking spot had been occupied by a brand new queen size bed, complete with tasteful yet cheerful sheets, pillows and duvet.  But then it just kept coming.  At least 2 or 3 times a month, Ed would find upon waking up that another shipment of stylish new furniture had been mysteriously delivered in the dead of night, always fully assembled, and always arranged very carefully to brighten up the place while still allowing maximum possible use of the available space.  And whoever was doing it was apparently very efficient about it, because he had never heard a peep from them, and always slept right through it.  Nobody he had talked to at the furniture store had any knowledge of what was going on, at least none that they would admit to.  It was clear to Ed that this was a well-organized and professional operation.  And in spite of his best efforts, nothing he tried to do seemed to be able to stop it.

And here he was, late for work already and facing the dilemma of yet another living room set on the front lawn.  And the clouds on the horizon made it clear that he was going to need to get the stuff inside unless he wanted it rained on.  Ed quickly took out his cell phone and scanned through his contacts list, trying to see if he could find someone he could call for some help.  Lately this had become an increasingly difficult task, as many of his friends stopped answering his calls after the fourth or fifth time he needed help hauling stuff into the garage.  Not that he had a whole lot of room in the garage anymore anyway.  A lovely dining room group was currently occupying the space where his car once parked, and a nice computer desk and set of filing cabinets followed soon after, as did a set of dresser drawers and nightstands, and a couple of rather large decorative vases.  Even Ed had to admit that it was all pretty nice stuff (at least in comparison to the mixed assortment of bachelor pad hand-me-downs and garage sale specials that comprised the current decor of his house) but somehow that didn’t provide a whole lot of consolation when he knew he was going to have to call the boss and explain that he was going to miss the meeting because the lawn is full of brand new furniture.  Yes, again.

After a couple of calls that went straight to voicemail, Ed quickly carried the lamp into the house and made his way to the shed in the backyard, realizing he would need to sort this one out later.  As he trudged back toward the front yard with a couple of giant blue tarps, he silently rued the day that he had signed up for the furniture store’s spam list.