Boingers

The trash people would not take the queen mattress I stashed in our garage. Misty and I bought a new mattress last year and ever since the old spring Sealy mattress has been standing upright in our garage. Not anymore.

I put the mattress out with our trash hoping against hope that the trash man would take the large item. No such luck. I was livid. I stayed home from work, the Friday after Thanksgiving, waiting for those guys. When they wouldn't take it, I took drastic actions.

That included bolt cutters, a utility knife, and no less than 10 trash bags. I ripped the mattress along the sides, used the bolt cutters to cut out the steel frame and put it all in trash bags. This item will be taken, the trash man will not win this battle, he will take that mattress away, one way or another.

The springs that make up the mattress comprise 33 in each row (more or less). This left a ton of springs. Stashed in trash bags, it seems like the springs would be more useful for something, but I couldn't figure out what for. I decided to ask my eight year old what we could do with the springs.

"Madeline," I asked, "what would you do with about 600 of these springs?" as I held up a sample. She was laying on the couch watching TV and this caught her attention. Immediately. She sat straight up, "I would tie these to my shoe and spring . . . " she told me.

We attempted to secure a set of springs to a pair of shoes. Madeline said, "Dad. I want to name them "Boingers"." We went to the store later that day to find some velcro strips. The strips will be used to tie the spring to the foot. Unfortunately, we couldn't get the boingers to production.

Although the velcro did its job, the spring is too long and Madeline couldn't get enough leverage to depress the spring sufficiently (and reliably) while making a normal step. The springs would bend at right angles from her stride which isn't desirable. The springs are too long. Back to the "boinger" drawing board.