Ranking the top seven pieces of household furniture

It's one of the oldest debates in the world: What's the best piece of household furniture?

Never heard anyone argue over that? Well, you don't live in my brain, because it's been a topic of debate since I thought of it a few weeks ago.

Is it a bed? The kitchen table? The couch? A favorite chair?

Put another way: If you could only keep one piece of furniture, what would you pick?

The MVP – most valuable piece (of furniture) – seems obvious to me, but the rest of the rankings aren't.

Until now. Here, by (un)popular demand, is the definitive ranking of household furniture, based on versatility, utility and how your life would look if they disappeared.

7. Desk. This became increasingly important for many of us since March 2020. Having a dedicated place to place your computer and other such items is valuable. Trust me. I'm sitting at my desk (a converted sewing table) as I write this. However, it's not irreplaceable. Just ask anyone working at a kitchen table (see below).

6. Living room chair. You could survive without a living room chair, but you wouldn't prosper. In virtually any house in America, the most-used piece of furniture is the best living room chair, invariably placed in a direct line from the TV. It's like Kevin Durant when he played for the Warriors. Not necessary, but sure makes things better.

5. Kitchen table. Even if you don't use it for meals, it provides a large, flat storage area for papers, mail and anything else. It's also valuable when needed: If you only use it a few times a year, those are important meals.

4. Coffee table. My friend Nick convinced me that it belongs here because of versatility: You can put food on it, use it as an ottoman and even use it for storage. He's right. The Swiss Army knife of furniture.

3. Chest of drawers/dresser. An aside: When Mrs. Brad and I married, our first big argument was over where to put the chest of drawers. We kept arguing and neither of us could believe that the other person was serious: Why would you put a chest of drawers there? Ultimately, we realized that what Mrs. Brad called a chest of drawers is what the rest of the world calls a dresser – the longer, lower item with drawers and a mirror. It was the last major argument I won. On point for these rankings: What happens if your chest of drawers/dresser disappears? Do your clothes go in boxes? This is the ultimate storage solution – furniture as storage!

2. Bed. Back in the day, I could sleep anywhere. On a couch. In a chair. On the floor in either a sleeping bag or with a blanket. In a car, if necessary. The older I get, the more important the bed becomes. This provides a service no other piece of furniture provides: A place for blissful sleep. That's invaluable.

1. Couch. The king of the castle, because it is a quadruple-threat. It can be a place for (multiple) people to sit. It can be a favorite chair. We can eat while sitting on a couch, making it a replacement for a kitchen chair and table. The final bonus is that serves as the backup to your bed. You can sleep on the couch. If you only had one piece of furniture, this would be the pick. It's the Bo Jackson of furniture.

Reach Brad Stanhope at BradStanhope@outlook.com.

The naked truth about medical patients and those paper robes

So I was at the doctor's office recently, ready for a minor procedure.

The physician's assistant did all her work – taking my blood pressure and pulse, asking what medications I take, confirming my pharmacy, asking why I was there (aren't all of those things written down? Didn't I already tell multiple people these things and fill out a form about them? Is this an effort to catch me in a lie?).

She informed me that as a diabetic, I would have my feet checked, so I needed to take off my shoes and socks. Then she handed me one of those paper robes and told me to put it on and have the opening in the front.

She started to leave.

"Um, I have a question," I asked.

She stopped, no doubt wishing I would just follow orders.

"What do I need to take off?" I asked.

"What?"

"For the robe. What clothes do I take off?"

The doctor needed to see my torso, but the physician's assistant handed me a robe. And told me to put it on, with the opening in front. Was I supposed to totally undress?

"Just your shirt."

"OK. One more question."

I'm pretty sure they love me at the doctor's office and find my curiosity charming. The physician's assistant looked up. I could ask my question.

"Do people sometimes take off too many clothes? Do you sometimes come back in the room and they're naked? Maybe naked for a blood pressure test?"

I barely got it out, because I was starting to giggle, thinking of the awkward situation of a doctor walking in for a consultation and the patient sitting there, buck naked except for a paper robe.

"Yes. That happens sometimes. A lot of times in the summer, because it's warm." Then she left.

What?

What?

I laughed at the idea of someone mistakenly taking off too many clothes. I envisioned someone naked except for a paper robe while an uncomfortable doctor looks in their ears or checks out a spot on their arm. Maybe someone with no pants on as the doctor simply asks them questions about their eyesight.

But she gave a different answer: She said that people took off their clothes a lot in the summer. Because it was hot.

Did she mean that some people go to the doctor's office and disrobe because they get overheated? That some patients would prefer to sit on an uncomfortable bench in a stranger's office while wearing a paper robe that keeps opening . . . because it's hot?

That can't be true, right? I mean, I get that people misunderstand directions – after all, had I not asked for clarification, I might have disrobed for an appointment where my doctor just had to check out my torso (I envision her walking in and saying, "What do you think you're doing, you freak?" while I tried to keep the paper robe closed and wondered the same thing).

But do some people enjoy disrobing at the doctor's office? To wear that dreadful paper robe?

That can't be true. I'm going to presume the physician's assistant didn't understand my question, although I'm not sure how that would happen.

People don't needlessly get undressed at the doctor's office to cool off, do they?

I may never again go to the doctor during the summer months. Who knows what happened in the room before I got there?

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.

Fifteen talking points to get you through the Super Bowl

If you're not a football fan on Super Bowl Sunday, it can be lonely.

I understand. I'm a football fan, but I know what it's like to not care about something that everyone else is fascinated by – after all, I don't care about Star Wars. Or MMA fights. Or plant-based foods. Or "Project Runway." (OK, I occasionally watch "Project Runway." But I don't care about the others.)

It's hard to be an outsider. If you're not a football fan (or a fan of commercials), today may be rough. Super Bowl Sunday is one of America's unofficial holidays and is practically unavoidable.

How to survive? I have some talking points to get you through – allowing you to see the commercials that people will be discussing Monday.

Here are 15 things you can say during the game that will make it seem like you are paying attention. Some are true.

• "Isn't it weird that Super Bowl is two words, but football is one word? And first down is two words but touchdown is one word?"
• "Nice play by Rams running back Sony Michel. Speaking of Sony, have you seen my Walkman? I lost it in 2007."
• "This is Super Bowl LVI. Do you know how to say that? It's pronounced, 'Livie.'"
• "I know Bengals running back Joe Mixon is good, but what do you think his life is like, having Joe Biden's first name and Richard Mixon's last name? Wait. It's not Richard Mixon? Really? Boy have I been wrong for a long time. This is embarrassing. Next, you're going to tell me it wasn't Jimmy Barter."
• "Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford is the grandson of Jim Stafford. You know, the guy who sang 'Spiders and Snakes' in the 1970s."
• "Cincinnati has a good football team, but you know what is really big there? Cincinnati is the capital of cornhole!"
• "Oh, sure, this halftime show is enjoyable, it's Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg! But they've got to go a ways to beat Up With People, who did four Super Bowl halftime shows.  I presume they were in favor of people, which is admirable. Oh, sorry. I'll be quiet so you can listen."
• "Oh, Eminem is performing. Which reminds me, please hand some of those multi-colored button-shaped chocolates. I can't remember what they're called."
• "Which team is the 49ers?"
• "Rams coach Sean McVay is the youngest coach in the NFL. He's 14 and is in eighth grade."
• "Did you know that Rams' receiver Cooper Kupp has a third arm sticking out of his chest? That's why he catches so many balls."
• "This game is being played in SoFi Stadium. Do you think they're using WiFi and listening to a HiFi? Hahahaha. Isn't it weird that Super Bowl is two words, but . . . "
• The Bengals have never won a championship. They're kind of like Susan Lucci. You know, Erica Kane on 'All My Children.' Oh, sorry. I didn't know you were paying attention to the game."
• "I know this is important, but is it OK if I flip over to the Puppy Bowl for a second?"
• "The winner of the game gets the Lombardi Trophy. It's named after that legendary NFL coach whose name everyone knows: Vince Trophy."

Reach Brad Stanhope (who really doesn't like Star Wars) at brad.stanhope@outlook.com.

Want good news? Here are some bad events that don't happen much anymore

You hear it all the time. In fact, you've probably said it: "The world is getting crazier all the time. There's so much bad news. It's depressing."

Sure, we're in the third year of a pandemic (four, if you count 2019, when it actually started). There's unprecedented division in American politics. There are insane weather events every few months. There are school shootings virtually every month.

But it could be worse. Much worse, because it was worse in my childhood. This isn't a "back in my day, we really had it rough" column. No, wait. I guess it is.

It's also an attempt to note that four scary things that dominated the news in the 1970s and early 1980s rarely happen now – and we don't realize it.

Kidnappings for ransom. When was the last time you heard about someone being abducted and held for ransom? This was a regular thing back in the day. Someone famous would be taken by armed men and held in exchange for $1 million or the release of prisoners or something else. Sure, there was Patty Hearst, but there was also John Paul Getty and Aldo Moro and all those kids on that school bus in Chowchilla. Stranger abductions still happen, but not for ransom.

Skyjackings. You couldn't get through a week in the 1970s without there being a plane hijacked (cleverly called "skyjacked"). Maybe to Cuba, which seemed crazy. Maybe to Rome.  Maybe to an African country. Heck, D.B. Cooper became a legend by hijacking a plane in Portland, getting $200,000 and jumping out over southwestern Washington. When was the last time you heard about a plane being hijacked? Sept. 11, 2001, changed everything. Now we have intense security at airports and anyone who hijacks a plane is much more likely to be killed by the other passengers than to arrive safely at their destination. Skyjackings have largely disappeared from our consciousness. There were 130 American skyjackings between 1968 and 1972. You know how many American airplanes have been skyjacked since Sept. 11, 2001? Zero.

Plane crashes. Some still happen, but did you know that there were two U.S. commercial plane crashes in 2021, both minor (at least to those of us not onboard)? Compare that to 40 years ago, when there were seven fatal crashes of American commercial airliners, killing a combined 195 passengers. Heck, for much of my childhood, it felt like a rock star was killed in a plane crash every couple of months. There has been one passenger fatality in a U.S. commercial airline crash since 2019. Planes almost never crash.

Serial killers. When was the last time you heard about a serial killer? I guess it could be happening, but we would likely notice it. Think about the 1970s and 1980s, when we had a stream of serial killers. There was Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy. There was Juan Corona and Jeffrey Dahmer. There was Richard Ramirez and Wayne Williams. There was even the Zodiac killer, who we never identified. Was there something about that era that led to serial killers?

So yeah, the news is often bad. It feels gloomy. But look on the sunny side: Plane crashes, skyjackings, kidnapping for ransom and serial killers have virtually stopped.

That's one bit of the past that isn't worth nostalgia.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.