Furniture Store Extravaganza!

Those of you who have been to IKEA are familiar with the idea that going to a furniture store can be an adventure. Jordan’s Furniture takes this experience to a whole new dimension.

Yes, it is a furniture store. You step in the door, and straight ahead is a candy store made of jellybeans, in the shape of Boston’s capitol building. Beyond, a giant fuzzy green monster (Fenway Park icon) is popping out of the wall, eating a manikin dressed as a baseball player. To the left is a burger joint/bakery/butcher shop that would put a little Swedish concession counter to shame. To the right are more jellybean sculptures--giant flowers--and on top of the ice cream parlor, a banana split being assembled by a crane. Across from the ice cream parlor, children swing from a trapeze and beyond that “Liquid Fireworks”--water jets spotlighted in shifting brilliant colors--dance to dramatic classical music and pop hits like “I Will Survive” and “It’s Raining Men.”

My favorite part was the “Sleep Lab”--where customer service representatives wearing white lab coats help you discover your “Sleep Number” so you’ll know how to program your adjustable mattress to relieve back pain and allergies.

We were not there to buy furniture but to take advantage of a couple coupons. One for the burger joint and one for the ice cream parlor--where got two cones, each piled high with 3 big scoops of super premium (that’s 16% or more butterfat) ice cream--for a total of $3.75. I was thinking some new words to that old poem:

Savor ye ice cream while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying;
Before your metabolism fleets away
It’s no time for denying.
Come lads and lasses, munch today
On foods made crisp by frying.