The Bean Bag From Hell

How a giant black void almost drove me to bankruptcy

William Sidnam
Human Parts

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That’s me in the corner, losing my relevance. Photo by William Sidnam.

One year ago, I made the stupidest decision of my life.

I bought a bean bag.

Perhaps that doesn’t sound that bad, but it was. In fact, it was a nightmare I wouldn’t wish upon my worst enemy.

The idea was simple enough. Tired of hurting my backside on my couch-bed hybrid that my landlords had bought before I had arrived on the scene, I longed for the comfort that a proper bean bag would deliver. As I was also eyeing up a home projector at the time, I figured that a bean bag would make an ideal viewing spot from which to watch bad movies.

So one day in August 2023, with nothing better to do, I opened my browser and went shopping. Before long, I came across a bean bag manufacturer in the UK that had good reviews on their wares. So doing the sensible thing, I selected a ‘giant’ bean bag and hit the order button. At £231.66, it was fairly pricey, but hey — I figured I could afford one stupidly expensive purchase a year.

It then hit me that due to Brexit, there were also tariffs to pay — tariffs that increased the price by a good £130. But by this point, I was so far down the rabbit hole, I’d long since passed the point of no return. I checked my bank balance, sighed, then confirmed…

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