non-euclidean geometry in the bedroom

[kaberett]

A couple of months ago I wound up seeing a tumblr post about The Burrito Method of getting a duvet into its cover[1], and promptly went !!! because I got myself a superking when I moved to London (a grown-up duvet for my first double bed!) and have Loathed changing its cover ever since.

The first time I experimented with it, I did it solo. The second time, I asked A if he would like to Share An Experience.

So we laid out the duvet cover, and we laid out the duvet, and we rolled it up, and I said "and now you invert the corners!" and wound up staring at my hands in confusion while I tried to remember exactly how the magic works. It was at this point that A started Voicing His Doubts about how this could Possibly Work.

Hold-on-give-me-a-moment I muttered, or something like that, and did the corner trick. A was still going "this geometry doesn't work. this doesn't work? this cannot work." as I started unrolling again.

A stunned silence Developed. Briefly. And Then Came The Denouncements Of This Witchcraft, followed by some more silence and a thousand-yard stare while he tried and failed to work out what in the name of fuck had just happened, geometrically speaking, and long story short-ish I'm not saying he's safeworded non-Euclidean etc but also...

[1] ugh okay edited to be a link from further down the reblog chain that does work, as opposed to the one that doesn't grump grump :-p

Comments

[jedusor]

they are not the same! comforters don't have covers; here is an explainer. (do you guys call comforters something else, or do you just not have them?)

[madgastronomer]

We have them, and in my experience, they are, or used to be, more common than duvets. A lot of people here just don't distinguish.

[judiff]

O that would be an "eiderdown" in UK english (even if it's not stuffed with down) but like they are super old fashioned and duvets like pretty much totally replaced them in the 70's and 80's

But the video linked to above is someone saying they are putting a "comforter" into a "duvet cover"! So it seems like comforter is the like generic word? (Even when it doesn't fit the pairing word)

[jedusor]

dude, I already answered the question. Iain Stirling pronounces sandwich "sangwich," would you like to defend that life choice on behalf of everyone in the UK?

[judiff]

You seem like angry and I don’t want to upset you.

You posted a link that said comforters and duvets are different and only duvets go into covers and asked what comforters are called on the UK. So I did the continuing the conversation and tying to make sense of the answer thing of explains about the U.K. word eiderdown and asked about the one area where the information you provided doesn’t fit with the video we were commenting on - that a comforter is being put in a cover. That was like curiosity and trying to refine my understanding not like an attack

I don’t expect any one American to be able to like answer for all American dialects. Or any one UK person. It would be perfectly reasonable for you to say (assuming it’s true) that you’ve always heard comforter and duvet used differently and don’t know why the video-person would be putting a comforter in a duvet cover or that it’s a regional variation or the person is just being weird or whatever
But it’s not like I’m snarking about how an obscure this-one-person-you-might-never-have-heard-of-said-this-thing-one-time so you are therefore Bad and Wrong. I’m just trying to make sense of how the video shared in this thread fits with the information you provided.

And I have no idea who Iain Stirling is but there are d/g/j mergers in some UK accents (like how garage gets pronounced “ga-rid-j” particularly in the South East/London). As well as the obvious fact that different people have different mouths and vocal cords that make slightly different sounds even within the same accent group

[kaberett]

Yo, I am reading you as snapping here -- I do not think this is something you make a habit of, but please try not to. <3

(Snapping at me is fine -- I am confident we can sort ourselves out! -- but I would like folk to Assume Good Faith in conversations in comments, and if that's not possible to check in with me Less Publicly for calibration or to ask me to step in. & for my part apologies for not managing to stay caught up on comments.)

[recessional]

But the video linked to above is someone saying they are putting a "comforter" into a "duvet cover"!

If you read the Nordstrom link above in full, it will note that some people put comforters inside duvet covers.

The difference is between whether or not the blanketing-shaped-thing is intended to be required to be used with a cover, or without it.

If it can be used without a cover, it is a comforter, whether or not you put it in a cover. If it should on no account or ever be used without a cover, it is a duvet.

Hope that helps clarify.

[judiff]

That makes sense, thanx