Mattress Sizes: Single, Double, Queen, King & Super King ...

Welcome back! And welcome, everyone, to the 40th Official Band of the Week post! If this were a wedding anniversary, the traditional gift would be Ruby. As you and I are not married, and this is 40 weeks and not 40 years, I will instead content myself with fond memories of Pokemon Ruby.
My first advice for you as a reader this week would be to go back to read the Part One post. This write up continues where that one left off.
To recap: John Lennon had a shitty upbringing with bad parents and tragedy all around, and turned to music to cope. He started a band called The Quarrymen. Paul McCartney and George Harrison joined that band. Lennon’s friend Stuart Sutcliffe also joined but found it to be too much work and quit. Pete Best thought it was awesome and was happy to join.
Best, Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison cut their teeth playing nightly gigs in Hamburg and then later in Liverpool. The band, now called The Beatles, got tons of buzz, got a manager, got a record deal, and went into the studio. They fired the handsome Best and replaced him with this thing.
Lennon, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr proceeded to record seven hit albums and make some teen movies and became the biggest band in the world. Bigger, you might say, than a particular religious deity.
As we leave behind the month of Banuary and now enter Bebruary, our focus on bands with the letter B continues.
Thanks for sticking around! It is time for Part Two of THE BEATLES.
About Them
With Revolver, The Beatles had set a high-water mark in their recording careers. Many critics consider it to be the best album they would ever release.
How do you follow that up?
By doing something completely different.
The vast majority of Rock music, from the 1950’s to the present day, has been released on an album. These albums are typically between 40-80 minutes in length and contain a 7 or more songs. Fall below 40 minutes and 7 songs and you are in EP range; go above 80 minutes and you go into Double LP range. Most recordings lie somewhere in between.
The standard for songs was to put the best or most catchy ones as the first one or two tracks on either side, and to bury the rest of the tunes later on the record. This was in part because the popular songs would then be easier to play right at the start, and in part because the audio quality (particularly the bass) tended to deteriorate the closer you got to the middle of the vinyl album. So LP records ended up being some good songs with filler.
And most of these albums are just gatherings of songs -- basically, whatever ideas the band had for songs, all thrown together, and then pressed into vinyl (or released on Bandcamp or to Spotify or on 8-track or cassette...you get the idea). There is a whole long history of this separate from the current narrative, but suffice it to say that the album is to music what the book is to publishing: the accepted and standard form. To stretch this further, the album was like a collection of short stories, each one distinct and different from the rest. This really is still the case today. We live in a world dominated by the single track, with most of us picking and choosing our playlists of individual songs rather than playing through an entire album.
I’m sure you can see where this is going.
The boys thought and thought and wondered how to follow up Revolver. What followed shook the recording world to its core, and in particular sent other artists into a spiral.
The concept album.
What if the entire album was thematically linked, and there were no throwaway tracks? What if each song was like a movement in a symphony? What if each track was not a separate short story but a chapter in a larger novel?
And so, in 1967, we get to the absolutely groundbreaking album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Sure, there are some that might argue that The Beach Boys album Pet Sounds did it first. However, Brian Wilson famously had a nervous breakdown when he heard Strawberry Fields Forever, a song that was cut from Sgt. Pepper’s. He reportedly pulled over in his car, burst into tears and said, “They got there first”. So it is kinda tough to argue that The Beach Boys were the pioneers here when their own leader says they weren’t. And yes, you could argue that Frank Sinatra had done this before, as had Bing Crosby, and Nat “King” Cole, and a number of Country artists. Hell, a broad definition of what a concept album could be might even include a Christmas album.
But The Beatles did it with Rock and Roll.
Whole books have been written about Sgt. Pepper’s. There are conspiracy theories about the photos on the cover, which contributed to the long standing tinfoil hat wearing idea that Paul McCartney had died and was replaced by a lookalike. The cover of the album is a who’s who of important people in the 60’s.
The album revolves around the story of the fictional titular band and their experiences. From the very first tuning sounds that open the album to the haunting chord that ends A Day In The Life, it was unlike anything that had come before. So many innovative things happened on this record that they are tough to list. It was widely considered to be the soundtrack of The Summer of Love. It used orchestral music. It was mixed with multiple takes and sound effects. There were various musical styles, sometimes within the same song. It elevated Rock music to an art form.
Oh, and if the drug use was not open enough, it also had the song Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.
The tour for Revolver had been disastrous. There were death threats in Japan, hate from Imelda Marcos fans in the Philippines, and John Lennon had shot his mouth off and was caught on a microphone saying that The Beatles were “more popular than Jesus”. He also met and started hanging out with a woman named Yoko Ono.
That one did not sit well with fans in the Bible Belt, and led to riots and record burning. The Jesus comment, not the Yoko thing.
So when the band spent months in the studio, expectations for Sgt. Pepper’s were high. Some wanted the band to succeed and others were (quite literally) praying for them to fail.
As it turns out Jesus is also a Beatles fan. Allegedly. Not sure if he was a Yoko fan though.
Sgt. Pepper’s won multiple Grammy awards, went to number one everywhere, and remains a cultural landmark in recording. Its influence cannot be overstated. Our very own QotSA famously did their own concept album in Songs For the Deaf, following the groundbreaking trail The Beatles had blazed.
The most interesting thing that happened, though, was that The Beatles flat out stopped touring. They just did not do it. They wanted to make music, and they wanted to do it in the studio. The Revolver tour was so terrible that they did not want a repeat of it, and the work on Sgt. Pepper’s was so amazing that they wanted to spend more time recording.
Just by way of comparison, Sgt. Pepper’s took The Beatles over 700 hours to record. Compare this with their first album - Please Please Me - which they reeled off in 13 hours.
Since the band refused to tour, the studio wanted to find a way to still milk that cash cow keep The Beatles relevant in popular culture. Immediately after their landmark concept album, they conceived of a made for TV movie. This would be called the Magical Mystery Tour.
It was awful.
Today, we mostly know the name from the song. The BBC TV movie was a series of vignettes and short sketches loosely connected about a group of people on a ‘mystery tour’ - essentially a bus trip where the destinations are a surprise. In this story, the tour members meet a group of ‘magicians’ (our heroes) who take the tour members on weird adventures.
There is a coordinated attack on a stuffed cow. There is an incomprehensible Drill Sergeant. There is a spaghetti incident. People watch strippers. The guests walk on tables. There was a sequence where the band were selling ice cream and lollipops. A man chases women around a pool. There was even footage from Dr. Strangelove for a flying sequence. Nothing made sense, and the public reaction was a resounding thumbs down.
You know how when you are high or drunk, certain things make total sense? Like, it was totally a good idea to call your ex and try to get back together? Magical Mystery Tour was like that. It made sense to the band when they made it, but when they saw the final product it was utter trash…just like my ex. After it aired McCartney went on TV to make a public apology for it. In fact, the reception was so poor that no one even bothered to keep the original negatives of the film.
The only good thing to come out the film was the EP of the same name, which had the title track and The Fool on the Hill and Hello Goodbye and the monster single All You Need is Love. That last song was actually released as part of a live TV event in the summer of 1967 and was absolutely huge for the band. It didn’t appear in the TV show but it was added to the soundtrack for later releases.
But what was on the album and on the TV show was the completely fucked up and drug induced track I Am the Walrus.
The track is a complete and utter drug trip, written by John under the influence of LSD. The Beatles were just trying to show that they could write absolutely anything and make it popular. Seriously, a Walrus? Egg men? Corn flake sitting? Lewis Carrol references? Lennon deliberately wrote the lyrics to confound and confuse scholars who were trying to analyze the band’s work. After he completed it he famously quipped, “Let the fuckers work that one out.”
And the drugs don't stop there. Just listen to Blue Jay Way, Flying, and the ever insane Strawberry Field Forever. If you’ve somehow never heard any of these, you’re in for a wild ride.
Yet all the same, contemporary critics were not impressed with the album. The TV film was a mess, and even though history has vindicated the soundtrack, it was largely panned at the time as well, due to how much critics hated the film.
Instead of doing something more in line with their fun and fluffy previous movies, the band doubled down on the drugs with Yellow Submarine. But in a kid-friendly kind of way. Sort of.
This animated film is set in Pepperland, which is a beautiful, peaceful and idyllic country that (clearly) needed to increase their military spending.
Pepperland is immediately overrun by the armies of The Blue Meanies, led by Venuz B Meanie, known as ‘His Blueness’ and his fierce weapon, the Dreadful Flying Glove.
Yeah, you read that right.
What is even weirder for you right now is that while this movie plot doesn’t make a lot of sense, it is way easier to follow than the lyrics in I am the Walrus, so you are just letting it go.
Basically, the film revolves around the journey of Young Fred, the last free person in Pepperland, to find and recruit The Beatles to journey back to Pepperland to help overthrow the Blue Meanies. This is accomplished, and the Meanies are then assimilated into Pepperland culture. In this process multiple Beatles songs, old and new, are worked into the script and performed. The band only appear at the end of the movie in a short live action sequence. The voices of their animated counterparts were provided by actors.
While the animation in the film looks rudimentary and was immediately out of date (for reference, The Flintstones, The Jetsons, and Scooby-Doo look more realistic and have better movement), the film was whimsical and fun and wayyyyyyy better than Magical Mystery Tour. In fact, the movie has had a lasting impact and continues to resonate today. If you don’t believe me, consider this: in Avengers: Endgame, Iron Man calls Nebula a Blue Meanie. Which is actually accurate, all things considered.
The soundtrack of the movie - including the new tracks All Together Now, Hey Bulldog, and Only a Northern Song - was released as the band’s tenth album. Also included on this release (since it was also in the movie) were Yellow Submarine (duh) and All You Need is Love (again). The flip side of the vinyl was all the orchestral numbers from the film. This became their tenth studio album, and was (essentially) a record to satisfy the studio rather than a true new effort.
If you are a Beatles nerd, you’ll notice that I have not yet mentioned their ninth album, and just referred to their tenth.
This is because it took a while to actually animate Yellow Submarine (though it in part looks like it was drawn by some talented 11 year olds as a school project). The live action bit at the end of the movie was recorded before the band famously went on a retreat to India and then went on to record The Beatles (which most people call the White Album ).
So after a disastrous Magical Mystery Tour and leaving the animators to spend almost a year completing Yellow Submarine, The Beatles decided that they wanted to go on a vacation.
Doesn’t a vacation sound nice? Remember when we could actually go and visit other exotic locations?
This vacation was not just to be a chance for the band to decompress - it was for them to go and take a three month course in guided meditation led by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in Rishikesh, India. The goal was to seek out Eastern wisdom and a new outlook on life. It was a deliberate attempt to achieve enlightenment and inner peace.
Have you ever gone on vacation with friends from work?
It rarely goes well. You learn a lot about your friends that you probably did not ever want to know, and they see you at your worst. Like, too much information kinda stuff.
This trip was worse than that.
To be fair, the upside of this trip to India was a prolific explosion of songwriting. The downside was the trip itself was a complete shit show, and the Maharishi totally hit on a number of the wives and girlfriends of the band. Ringo tapped out before two weeks had gone by. McCartney lasted a month, and Lennon and Harrison made it two months before they also quit.
The fact that they all went there together but left separately was a real indicator of not only how bad the retreat went, but of how the band members were growing apart. There had been some foreshadowing of this. When Pete Best was the most popular Beatle, he was turfed by the other three. Lennon especially had been jealous of Best’s growing fame in the group he had founded. If one takes a look at the Lennon/McCartney songwriting partnership, it is clear that the early Beatles records were dominated by Lennon. But McCartney’s incredible talent as a songwriter - as evidenced by Yesterday and Eleanor Rigby - was quickly growing to eclipse Lennon’s own. Many music critics have stated that the early Beatles were about Lennon, but the second half of their catalogue are about McCartney.
This was a huge problem for Lennon.
Plus Lennon was now dating Yoko Ono.
Ono was almost 10 years older than Lennon, and became the missing mother figure in his life.
Lennon had met Cynthia Powell at the Liverpool College of Art and had married her in 1962 when she got pregnant. His son Julian was born in 1963 and because The Beatles were touring, he did not see him for three days. Powell’s marriage to Lennon was kept secret so that Lennon could still attract young female fans. It is a matter of record that Lennon beat Cynthia. Remembering this behavior, Lennon said: “I used to be cruel to my woman, and physically - any woman. I was a hitter.” After coming home from a holiday, she found Lennon and Ono together in her home wearing bathrobes. Her marriage was over.
Lennon was barely involved in raising Julian, and remained distant and absent in his upbringing. Julian Lennon famously grew closer to Paul McCartney than to his own father. The elder Lennon spent years in the 1970’s focusing on his relationship with Ono and his other son rather than with Julian. In his will, John Lennon left his first born son almost nothing.
The other Beatles - especially McCartney - did not approve of Lennon’s behavior with his wife and son. This contributed to their dislike of Ono.
Ono was an avant garde artist in her own right, and had met Lennon at an art show in 1966. She had been married twice before she met Lennon. According to accounts, when they met, she had no idea who he was. But she soon learned he was a millionaire musician and wanted to sell him her art. She continued to reach out to him and Lennon grew more and more intrigued by her.
So there were deep divides in the band when they recorded the White Album, and those divides turned up in the music.
Conceived as a counterpart and opposite pole to Sgt. Pepper’s, The Beatles was a double album without any unifying theme. Sgt. Pepper’s had one central concept and an incredibly busy cover; The Beatles was a disparate and fractured double-LP with absolutely zero cover art. One album inspired Weezer and Metallica; the other did not.
Many of the songs on the White Album had been conceived and written in India. The tensions that had surfaced in India continued into the studio. For the first time, legendary producer George Martin grew so frustrated with the band during the recording sessions that he left and took a vacation. Ringo Starr flat out quit the band for two weeks during these sessions before the other members asked him back, leading McCartney to do the drumming on Back in the U.S.S.R and Dear Prudence. Lennon refused to collaborate with McCartney on songwriting at all, calling efforts like Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da “granny music shit”. Lennon also brought Ono to the recording sessions, which ticked everyone else off.
The band had started their own corporations and label - Apple - and the White Album was released on that new label. But instead of the album being a unified effort, it really ended up being a set of quasi-solo projects. The band members described the recording process as difficult and fractious, and the songs themselves were George with the Beatles, John with the Beatles, Paul with the Beatles. Also, Ringo was (sometimes) there.
Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s may be their best albums, but The Beatles undoubtedly had some of their greatest songs. And it was clear that the best songs on the album were almost all McCartney songs. Back in the U.S.S.R, Blackbird, Helter Skelter, Why Don’t We Do It in the Road? and Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da were all immediately successful. Contrast these with Lennon’s efforts of Julia, Dear Prudence, Glass Onion, Sexy Sadie and Revolution. Only the latter song became a bona fide hit. Harrison even had a better song in While My Guitar Gently Weeps on the album than any of Lennon’s efforts.
But the best song that came out of these sessions, and maybe the greatest Beatles song of all time, did not even make the album. Released as a non-album single to promote Apple records in 1968, Hey Jude is perhaps the definitive Beatles song and, like Yesterday before it, is clearly a Paul McCartney tune. Even if you are not a fan of them you know this song. I honestly defy you to not sing along with the outro. The band themselves knew immediately how great it was, and released it with Revolution as a B-Side. Only Lennon dissented with that plan (which was not a shocker).
Hey Jude was an international number one hit. In a time of war and turmoil, it was interpreted as a plea for kindness and positivity. But the truth was that it was McCartney’s heartfelt message to young Julian Lennon - who would have been five years old at the time - about how, despite the fact that his father had ignored him, things would get better. And while that may not have ended up being strictly true for young Jude Julian, the message of hope struck a chord with audiences everywhere.
In an effort to try to mend some of the cracks in the band, Paul McCartney conceived of a film and album idea to capture some of the creative process. For the first time, the band entered the studio without producer George Martin, and turned to producer Phil Spector for the project. McCartney had wanted the band to tour again, but he was alone in this. He instead thought up the idea of filming the recording sessions and a live concert and putting it all together as a movie with a soundtrack. The working title of this project was Get Back. The band wrote a song of the same name to go with it. A photo shoot was done to mirror the cover of Please Please Me, and to show the change over time in the band while at the same time getting back to their roots. They brought in camera crews to document the process.
The band did their final public performance on January 30, 1969 on the roof of the studio, which was captured on film. But behind the scenes things completely fell apart and the band lapsed into angry lethargy. Harrison and Lennon allegedly got into a fistfight during the sessions. While a bunch of songs were recorded, the album and film project was left unfinished.
After this failure to produce an album, the band recognized that they needed George Martin to unify them. Martin agreed to produce another album with The Beatles provided that the band - and especially John Lennon - would do exactly what he told them to do, and be disciplined and professional.
The Beatles agreed.
The result was the album Abbey Road which, for some reason, has been canonically called their Gayest Album. I am really not sure why I am including this information but seeing as I saw this in my research, you now have to as well.
The cover of Abbey Road has the iconic photo of the four members of the band crossing the street. The photo has become a cultural touchstone and the site of it is now a common fan destination, with people going with friends to recreate the shot. It also reinforced the urban myth that Paul McCartney had died and was replaced by an imposter. Some interpreted the picture as Lennon, in white, being a Christ-like figure leading the others, with Ringo, in black, being an undertaker, followed by McCartney, barefoot, as a corpse, and Harrison, in denim, as the gravedigger.
To me, that seems like both a huge stretch and that someone had a ton of extra time on their hands to conceive of this kind of nonsense.
But others would point out that McCartney had a cigarette in his right hand - and he was left handed. They also said that the license plate of the car behind him, which read ‘28IF’, meant that McCartney would have been 28 if he had lived.
Again, a huge stretch. But this urban myth not only sold a lot of tinfoil, it contributed to the sales of the album. With tracks like Come Together, Something, Octopus’ Garden, Carry That Weight and Here Comes the Sun, it is loaded with Beatles classics. It even had an upbeat tune about a serial killer in Maxwell’s Silver Hammer. The 2nd half medley, capped off with The End, is a beautiful finale. But the cracks in the relationships were all still there. Lennon tried to insist that all of the songs that he had written on Abbey Road be on one side, almost as a Lennon EP. Martin refused. Lennon dismissed and derided McCartney’s work on the album.
Abbey Road would be the last time the Beatles would record together. In fact, six days before the album was released, Lennon formally quit the group. The Beatles were over. McCartney publicly declared that the band were no more in April of 1970.
The movie footage from Get Back and the songs recorded for it were the only unreleased material that the band had left. Phil Spector mixed and remixed the album a number of times before it was finally released, along with the film, under the name Let it Be. Even though people knew the band had broken up and were done, this was their swan song.
Released in May of 1970, it was not without controversy. Phil Spector added banter and chatter captured in the recording process, as well as orchestral parts and overdubs to a number of songs - most notably The Long and Winding Road. These additions did not sit well with McCartney. And while the album would win an Academy Award for the Best Original Score, McCartney would eventually release a revised version of the album called Let it Be...Naked with Spector’s additions removed. Two of Us and Across the Universe and Get Back and the (now) title track of Let it Be are Beatles classics that may have been born out of conflict, but are amazing songs nonetheless.
After the breakup of The Beatles, each of the members went on to have continued success in music. Harrison released solo albums, did a famous international concert for Bangladesh, personally funded and supported the Monty Python movie Life of Brian, formed and toured with The Traveling Wilburys, and survived being stabbed with a kitchen knife by a deranged fan in 1999. He died of cancer in 2001. He was 58.
John Lennon did much in his time after the Beatles. He and Yoko Ono would be married in 1969. They famously held peace protests and Bagisms and Bed-ins in support of anti-war efforts. His first solo song was Give Peace a Chance, which has become an anti-war anthem. Ono and Lennon had one son, Sean Lennon, in 1975. Lennon had a successful solo career and moved to New York City. He remained largely estranged from Paul McCartney for the rest of his life. He was murdered in New York in 1980, which created an outpouring of international grief.
Ringo Starr released a number of albums on his own in the 1970’s. His music was most notably done in collaborative efforts with other artists, including Quincy Jones, Maurice Gibb, Elton John and Marc Bolan. He even collaborated with Lennon and Ono’s Plastic Ono Band. After Lennon’s death, he collaborated with Harrison on All Those Years Ago as a tribute to Lennon. Through the 1990’s and into the 2000’s he toured with his All-Starr Band, a supergroup which at times included Tom Petty, Joe Walsh, and Jeff Lynne. He would play originals, Beatles tunes, and songs by other band members. He was knighted by Prince William in 2018. He is still alive today..
Immediately after The Beatles, Paul McCartney founded the band Wings, which became one of the most successful bands of the 1970’s, with seven platinum albums. With songs like Maybe I’m Amazed and Jet and Live and Let Die and Helen Wheels, he continued to top the charts for decades. His tours would include Beatles tunes as well as the new material, satisfying both sides of his fan base. He has collaborated with artists ranging from Dave Grohl to Michael Jackson. He was knighted in 1997 by Queen Elizabeth. He has an asteroid named after him. The guy is, to this day, a living music legend.
And he played a private concert for Josh.
Look, The Beatles are quite simply an amazing band that have influenced everyone. If you haven’t heard of them, I envy you - because you have so much to discover.
Enjoy!
Links to QOTSA
Check out the deep respect that Josh Homme has for George Harrison in this video where he is given the opportunity to play Harrison’s guitar. It is moving.
Josh Homme and Sir Paul McCartney both worked on the Dave Grohl project Sound City.
Apparently, McCartney was almost a member of Them Crooked Vultures - but learned from Dave Grohl that John Paul Jones already had the gig.
McCartney also went out of his way to play a show out in the desert for Josh and 300 fans. Imagine Sir Paul McCartney performing a show just for you. That is just amazing.
Their Music
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
With A Little Help From My Friends
A Day In The Life
Strawberry Fields Forever
Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
Magical Mystery Tour
I Am The Walrus
All You Need Is Love
All Together Now
Back In The U.S.S.R.
Blackbird
Helter Skelter
Revolution
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Hey Jude
Get Back
Come Together
Maxwell’s Silver Hammer
The Long And Winding Road
Two Of Us
Let It Be
Show Them Some Love
/Beatles - a huge subreddit with over 125,000 members.
/TheBeatles - almost 26,000 members.
Previous Posts
Band of the Week #1-25
The Jimi Hendrix Experience
Black Flag
Alain Johannes
Pixies
Truckfighters
Melvins
Muse
Stone Temple Pilots
Black Sabbath
Baroness
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
The Black Angels
The Black Keys
The Beatles, Part One

Ever since a Let’s Play got me into Stardew Valley, I’ve fallen in love with the world. It’s something special, a place to relax and get away from the world’s problems. Here, you can pay bills with the sweat of your own brow, make friends, fall in love, and can escape the drudgery of modern life. It’s magical in its own way.
I’ve played hundreds of hours over multiple save files. I’ve been wondering one thing just recently, however. I remember when I first asked Robin for house upgrades and the sheer bowel-emptying amount she asked for. Seriously? That much for a kitchen? Now that I haven’t left my house for the past several weeks, fear human contact, and have deep dived into the paranormal, I’m overthinking something constantly: with regards to modern housework, does Robin the carpenter over or under charge you for her work?
To figure this out, it’s going to require a fair bit of math and a lot of guesswork. I’m going to have to establish a lot of ground rules but I’m going to try and be as accurate to real world costs as I can. We need to learn four things:

• What year does the game take place so we can calculate accurate inflation?
• What is the square footage of the house and its upgrades?
• What is the exchange value of gold, the game’s currency?
• What is the cost of Robin’s labor?

Let’s tackle the first. To do this, I scoured around to look for modern conveniences. Primarily, I found these five:

• Leah mentions she has a laptop
• The carpentry shop sells Plasma screen TVs.
• There is what appears to be an old Apple computer monitor in Harvey’s clinic and Maru’s room.
• Sam has an electric guitar and what looks like a plasma screen computer monitor in his room.
• In Mr. Qi’s casino, the slot machines do not have a lever. This is important because that gives us a firm earliest date of 1963.

Another interesting factoid is the number of Cathode-ray TVs you see in Stardew Valley. These are the precursors to plasma screens, which were in turn succeeded by LCD screen TVs. Additionally, a large number of your starter houses comes preequipped with Cathode-ray TVs. Granted, this may be because the farmhouse was abandoned for many years before you came along, but there exists another such TV in 1 River Road where we often see George watching his shows. I will concede that George and Evelyn are quite old and may not have the tech savvy nature of Sebastian to get something more modern, so that can’t be an accurate measurement. Plus, Alex’s mental acumen is a little... questionable.
As for crafting recipes, there really isn’t anything worth talking about. Magic items I won’t talk about because it has no real world comparison; that also throws out the wizard shop’s items. The furniture catalog has nothing of note to pinepoint a date, and nor does Pierre’s General Store, Joja Mart, Joja Warehouse, the Blacksmith, Stardrop Saloon, or Marnie’s ranch. Leah doesn’t mention anything about her laptop, so that is of little help.
So the casino gives us a low bound. Although manufacturing of the plasma screen TV stopped in the US in 2014, plasma screen TVs were losing their market shares around 2007 and factories were shutting down. As you can buy them like hotcakes and fill a shed with them, 2007 is our upper bound.
The price for plasma screens was quite pricey for residential homes. 1995 was the year 42 inch plasma screens became commercial, and some had home installation priced somewhere around US$15,000. Still not quite the size of the queen or king sized bed you and your spouse have (the size of the plasma screen in the game), but sixty inch plasma screen TVs were sold around the year 2000, and that is plenty big. Given the size of the screen in the game is roughly three tiles just like your bed, I think it’s safe to say this is around the size of our estimate. Our rough year range is now 1995 to 2007. Let’s split the difference and say the game takes place in 2001.
We have our year.
To calculate the size of our farmhouse, we need some baseline measurement. Luckily, the game is pixelated so we can be quite accurate in our measurements. Unluckily, we have no confirmed height of anything, so we have to intuit some things. Reddit user asparagus made this excellent size chart, so while I can just use that and save myself a lot of work, let us do some measurements of our own and then measure the farmhouse with both this method and asparagus’ method.
First, there is the height of plants, but those can vary widely. For instance, you can pot prickly pear cactuses in your farmhouse, but their height can vary anywhere between one and seven feet. Plant height is a no go. The average height of a minifridge is forty three inches (109 cm) tall, so unless you are a dwarf, that’s not right either. The fences are also a good starting point, as most agricultural fencing stands at four feet (1.2 m).
Here we don’t have to do much; all fences are forty eight pixels in height. Four feet equals out to forty eight inches (121.92 cm). It doesn’t get more perfect than that!
Trigger warning: incoming math.
Now comes the really tricky part: getting the dimensions of each iteration of your farmhouse, and squinting at my computer screen like a mole in order to count pixels; we must include walls as well as that is included in square footage. Our first iteration has pixel measurements of 704x496. Add in the doorway (136x64pixels), and then we’ll still convert for square feet. 704 * 496 + (136 * 64) = 318,452 pixels/sq, which (dividing by 12^2) converts to 2,211.47 ft/sq. Damn, we’re well on our way for most modern mansions.
I have to have messed something up (205.45 m/sq, btw). The average firebox (the inside of a fireplace where you burn wood) tends to be around 32x20 inches (81.28x50.8 cm). Ours is... 72x40. Twice as large. I also haven’t even begun to calculate the farmhouse’s height because Robin is beginning to scare me.
Alright, new plan, we’re going with asparagus. I married Haley and took her measurements. She is 104 pixels tall, and since she is 65 inches (165.1 cm) according to asparagus, that gives us a measurement of .625 inches/pixel (1.5875 cm/pixel).
Side note, I really want some Twizlers right now.
So instead of having pixels as at a 1:1 ratio, we have something a little more lenient, but things are looking a little... grim. We’ll have to convert each individual amount, so we have (704 * .625) * (496 * .625) + ((136 * 64) * .625^2) for 124,395.31 inches/sq, 863.86 ft/sq., 80.25 m/sq. But still, we haven’t even begun to calculate the actual volume of our farmhouse yet, so these numbers are going to explode.
I’m beginning to think Robin is Hestia. Yoba is not the only deity in this town.
Alright, calculating the rest of the floor spaces is a little boring so let’s speedrun this.
Wall height for the farmhouse is 140 pixels, so (140 * .625) * 124,395.31 inches/sq / 12^3 = 6,298.95 ft^3 (178.36 m^3) for the farmhouse, and 25,800.51 ft^3 (730.58 m^3) using my method.
Just... let’s move on.
Second iteration has me doing a fair bit more work.
Wall height is 135 pixels, and rightmost—wait, the walls are shorter? Weird. Anyway, the rightmost room has dimensions of 486 for width by 375 for depth (and the same cubby dimensions), giving us cuboid dimensions of 24,603,750 pixels^3, which converts to 14,238.28 ft^3 (403.18 m^3), and 3,476.14 ft^3 (82.83 m^3) using asparagus' method
Middle corridor has a dimensional width of 42 pixels by 87 depth, giving us a total of 285.47 ft^3 (8.08 m^3), and 69.69 ft^3 (1.97 m^3) using asparagus' method.
Leftmost room (the kitchen) has a width of 870 and depth of 375, with a doorway of 136x64. That gives us a cuboid area of 314,019.38 ft^3 (29,173.11 m^3), and 6,388.74 ft^3 (180.91 m^3) using asparagus' method.
That gives us a grand total for a tier two home of...
... 328,543.13 ft^3 (29,584.37 m^3) using my method and
... 9,934.58 ft^3 (281.31 m^3) using asparagus' method.
So Robin added at a minimum 3,635.63 cubic feet to your house in three days by herself. Even if you extend the days and months to roughly align with our own calendar, that would be a mere nine days. How much powdered starfruit did she snort in order to do that by herself? I 100% believe Emily is the town’s dealer. I didn’t even calculate the length of the farmhouse loft. It’s doable, and even though you can’t enter it in the game, a bigger farmhouse means a bigger loft judging by the look of it.
Anyway, I’m not going to calculate the loft area right now. I’m not going to calculate the other tiers of your farmhouse either, even though that was my intent when I started this analysis. The math is easy enough, but it gets boring to type, and no doubt to read. Plus, I’m a little stunned by Robin's carpentry acumen. C’mon Robin, stop upgrading my house. Exercise with the girls, dance with your husband, smoke some weed, I dunno, RELAX.
But in a strange way, it makes a weird sort of sense. Pretty much no one plays the game with auto-run turned off, but do so for a moment. See how fast you move. That is your normal pace, and auto-run is you, an Olympian god, sprinting around town every second of every day, helping the shit out of everyone whether they want it or not, snorting the same starfruit mixture you got from Robin to keep going, who may have gotten it from Linus (my money is still on Emily). We’ve become so accustomed to seeing the run animation as our default I almost didn’t realize it doesn’t translate to modern life. The boards in your house, I almost took those as your normal 2x4 planks of wood (which actually measure 1.5x3.5, the world lies to me). They are not. They are almost the width of your entire body, and your walking pace (sorry I can’t get an exact pixel measurement) covers roughly one and a half boards, a similar length to a normal human gait. The art style fooled even me until now, but your house is massive.
Let’s just answer our other two questions. What is the exchange rate? Calculating the exchange rate of a fictional world is always tricky as they have different concepts of rarities, but I’ll give it the ol’ college try. Once again, I can’t do anything with magic. Let’s first list some things of note:

• Iridium is fairly easy to get around Stardew Valley once you are able, and that is a rare and valuable metal, with a current price of US$1,510 per troy ounce.
• You can purchase a golden column to place on your farm, and gold has a current price of US$1,643 per troy ounce
• Conversely, while the first two are rare and valuable metals, crops such as corn are valued at prices like 150g, a very unusually high amount if exchanged 1:1 to USA dollars.
• Going back to plasma screen TVs, we can use its price history and then convert currencies to Stardew Valley gold.

Now you may be tempted to say we can’t translate iridium and gold’s prices to real world market values, and normally you may be right, but there are some extenuating circumstances in the game: the town is right next to two very large mines. It is even a plot point once you clear the glittering boulder that the water carries ore from deep inside the mountain. Yes, gold and iridium are valuable, but your location to ore veins is important; gold and iridium may be uncommon resources but you have access to very specific places where they are more common, otherwise known as the scarcity heuristic). This also explains two facts about iridium: discounting magic, iridium is quite rare in the game, just like real life. Secondly, Clint’s prices make a lot more sense not only because it’s endgame material, but because iridium is super dense and has a very high melting point, thus making it a very difficult material to work with.
But by far the biggest challenge of this question is figuring out whether or not items you produce factor in the cost of your labor or not. For instance, lace is made of simple materials that even in the days of Victorian England, it was easy to get. However because lace was so time consuming to make, it could command absurd prices. Thus, one of the first things we need to discover is whether or not the game takes into account cost of labor or not.
So I am going to take you all back to school and talk about someone who’s old and dead: Adam Smith. It was he who talked about the cost of labor in his book The Wealth of Nations, and because of that, I bring up this particular line:

“...From century to century, corn is a better measure than silver, because, from century to century, equal quantities of corn will command the same quantity of labour more nearly than equal quantities of silver.”

Why did I mention corn above? This is why. Prices may vary, but agriculture has been around for thousands of years and the cost of a farmer’s labor equals about the same.
According to Dylan Baumann, Stardew Valley corn plants have a profit value of 535 gold per plant. Our corn plant profits are about as high as they can get without adding something new into the mix, and we don’t want that yet.
Let’s set some ground rules:

• Cultivatable farm space on the standard farm equals out to 3,427 spaces, but we’ll round that down to 3,350 for iridium sprinklers, iridium watering can, and scarecrows, equaling maximum farming with no loss of crop.
• We’ll keep Dylan’s ground rules, so no fertilizer.
• No preserves, jams, wine, and juices.
• No farming efficiencies and crop selling bonuses.
• No use of the greenhouse to grow crops outside of the growing season.

If you plant the entire farm with corn and stop harvesting on Fall day 28 when the growing season ends, that lets you harvest a total of 11 ears of corn per plant. Multiply that by 3,350, we get a total of 36,850 ears of corn for your entire farm. Corn is measured in bushels, and a bushel of corn can be anywhere between 40 and 60 ears of corn, but we’ll say you really pack it in for 60, meaning your growing season for corn produces 36,850 / 60 corn for a total of 614.17 bushels per year.
The USDA has a 2001 labor value of corn at US$2.92 per acre (and that matches the Iowa labor statistic), and using 156 bushels per acre, that brings our labor cost per bushel at... US$00.02. That’s a real pittance. Considering bushels of corn retailed around $2.11 per bushel in 2001, that is an incredible markup of 184.85 times.
We’re almost done with the dreaded math, I swear.
Corn retails at 100g apiece in Stardew Valley(You get 50 gold from Pierre, so he has a 100% markup), meaning the labor cost should be around 184.85 times less that amount, meaning it takes about 0.54 gold to make one ear of corn.
Your average US farmers salary $55,000 and $100,000, and we’ll take the middle of $77,500 for our measurements. Dividing the farmer’s salary by the total ears of corn our farmer grows in Stardew Valley, we get a labor cost per ear of corn in US dollars of $2.10 per ear of corn. Now we multiply this by our markup ratio to get the IRL retail cost of corn in Stardew, getting US$237.08! Damn that better be some good eating! We divide that number by the Stardew Valley retail cost of corn, netting us a real world conversion of gold of, drumroll please, $2.37 US dollars per gold in 2001.
Now just for funzies, let us calculate the actual salary of your famer in Stardew Valley. Multiplying your 36,850 ears of corn by 50 gold (your selling price of gold, not the retail price of 100g), that nets you 1,842,500 gold per growing season. Multiply that by the dollagold conversion we just calculated and your real life gross income comes out to be US$436,672,500.
Give me all of the golden clocks, wizard.
Three questions down, one more to go. Currency conversion was rather tricky because it involved quite a lot of math, but this last question, what is the cost of Robin’s labor, that requires the most assumptions. There’s an easy answer and a hard answer.
Robin’s upgrades, except for the last, require you the farmer to give her resources in addition to gold. The simple answer is you are providing materials in order to keep the raw gold cost down. This means that the first house upgrade, 10,000 gold, is strictly her labor cost as the 450 wood is all the raw materials she needs to build. 3 days * 3 months (to adjust Stardew month lengths to our month lengths) comes out to Robin working an IRL equivalent to 9 days. Taking 10,000 gold / 9 days equals a cost of 1,111.111 gold per day, and considering Robin has snorted enough powdered starfruit to have 20 hour work days, that comes out to 55.56 gold per hour.
Just to be sure, let’s see if the math holds up for the last upgrade. That one requires a cost of 100,000 gold and comes preequipped with 33 casks. You do not provide the resources for the casks, meaning that comes included with the cost. Casks cannot be sold, but the materials required to make them are 20 wood and 1 hardwood, which Robin will provide for the same 100% markup (meaning 4 gold and 30 gold respectively). 4 gold * 30 gold * 33 casks comes out to 3,960 gold. Using the same calculations for the first house iteration, we get (100,000 gold - 3,960) / (3 days * 3 months) / 20 hours for a total of 533.56 gold per hour.
Not even close to our first estimate. We could just average them together for (533.56 + 55.56) / 2 = 294.56 gold, and that would be the easy answer. It would be nice to settle for the easy answer.
Let’s find the hard answer. We are going to calculate labor cost per square footage, and luckily most of the work has been done over the course of several google spreadsheets. To find the cost of materials and money per upgrade volume we get the formula (Upgrade volume - Base Volume) / 10,000 gold. This gives us a grand total of cubic material built per gold of...
...2,573.26 in^3/gold, 30.27 ft^3/gold, 2.89 m^3/gold using my method and
...628.24 in^3/gold, 0.36 ft^3/gold, 0.01 m^3/gold using asparagus’ method.
Let’s see if the math holds up for the basement upgrade and dammit I just realized I got to do more pixel measurements now. Hold on, be back in an hour.
Alright, I’m back. We don’t need to do any subtraction for the previous volume of the house considering the cellar is its own little area, but we still need to subtract the value of the materials used for the casks. The cellar comes out to a grand total of cubic materials built per gold of...
...386.91 in^3/gold, 0.22 ft^3/gold, 0.01 m^3/gold using my method and
...94.46 in^3/gold, 0.05 ft^3/gold, 0.0015 m^3/gold using asparagus’ method.
Huge discrepancy.
Before I get into my reasoning why, let us outline what we know first.

• We’re pretty sure the game takes place in 2001.
• We have the exact sizes of each house upgrade calculated with two different methods.
• We have a certified exchange rate of US$2.37 at that point in time.
• We have two different methods of calculating the cost of Robin’s labor.
• The amount of work Robin does during her three(nine?) day job is absolutely obscene.

I come to one conclusion: Robin is a god that has settled down in the world of Stardew Valley.
Here me out. I have three pieces of evidence.
The first is when Robin is hired to take on a house upgrade job no one helps her, not even her husband Demetrius. Your house is right next to hers, so you’re not paying for travel. As we have shown by our calculations above and in the gDoc spreadsheet, that is a massive amount of work. It’s simply not possible for a human to accomplish such a monumental task. Robin claims she built her own home herself with this line from the game...

“Have I told you that I built our house from the ground up? It's definitely been the highlight of my career so far.”

...so we know her carpentry acumen is impressive enough for the job, but she has severely understated her skill. Homeadvisor pegs a house costing anywhere between US$150,000 to US$500,000 (US$102,005.53 to $340,018.44, adjusted for 2001 inflation), but even adjusted for inflation, Robin absolutely underbids the current housing market. Those inflation adjusted values, when converted to gold, come out to a range of 43,040.31g-143,467.70g. Granted, these prices are for a complete house, not adding onto a current house, but even if we half the value you are getting one hell of a discount.
The second piece is Robin’s language. The sheer passion for her work speaks wonders..

“Wood is a wonderful substance... it's versatile, cheap, strong, and each piece has its own unique character!”

...but perhaps she is just passionate about what she does. Many people are, but knowing what we do about how dirt cheap and blindingly fast she works let’s go into more detail about some things, specifically three lines. The first...

“Our little plan worked out well, don't you think? Pam and Penny seem really happy.”

...is said after Pam’s house undergoes an upgrade. “Our” plan? Sure, you are the one that buys the upgrade and Robin has to build it, but I can’t help but feel there is a double meaning behind this language. It is done out of the kindness of Robin’s heart and the materials have to come from somewhere, so she can’t do it for free, but it wasn’t about the money, as we have stated previously. It was about Penny.
Pam is a somewhat contentious person because of slobbish and slovenly nature. She is immediately and irrationally angered when Penny tries to pick the place up. She drinks heavily...

“\sigh*... My mother definitely has a problem with going to the saloon too much. But it's best not to dwell on bad things, right?”*

...doesn’t seem to understand not paying her tab has some consequences, and doesn’t realize what her habits have done to her daughter’s psyche.
Then you, the player come along. Pam is okay with the simple things in life, but you help Penny with her worries and insecurities, and then with you and Robin together, you give Penny everything she needs to help her shed those worries. She has a house that doesn have problems with rain, two friends who look out for her, her mom has a job, and most importantly she has peace of mind and in a world fraught with problems, that is truly priceless.
Then there is this line...

“Hey! I heard some weird noises last night, and woke up this morning to find the quarry bridge completely repaired! It's a miracle of woodworking!”

...and it occurs once you offer items to the community center junimos to get the quarry bridge repaired.
It is also a bald-faced lie.
The junimos are good, don’t get me wrong, but we’ve seen what Robin can do with our own two eyes. She is absolutely incredible at her job, and while I may give it to her she has no idea what junimos are or what they are capable of, we have proof that the act of restoring the bridge in one night is not out of the realm of possibility for her. A miracle, yes, but I’m certain she can beat the junimos’ time.
Lastly, there is one quote from her that is just... it opens up some very interesting questions. When she says...

“My parents were bewildered when I told them I wanted to be a carpenter. They were pretty old-fashioned.”

...how old are her parents when they consider carpentry too new-fashioned for them? Carpentry is one of the world’s oldest professions. If they were old-fashioned, why were they bewildered?
This line is just so fascinating to me. Robin is incredibly skilled, but I cannot rationalize carpentry being too newfangled for parents to wrap their head around. Who were they? Where are they from? I know your secrets, Robin, I know your parents are gods, too.
The third and final piece is the contrasting pieces of the world at large. Just like ours, it’s a little depressing. Joja Corp runs dozens of what even Cyberpunk would consider a dataslave farm. The world is flooded with consumerism run amok, Orwellian surveillance, and rampant urbanization. The Ferngill Republic is in the middle of a war with the Gotoro Empire and Kent still suffers PTSD from being in a prisoner of war camp.
Stardew Valley isn’t just a town to retire in, it is a place of respite and healing. There are three confirmed magic users deeply tied to the town’s mystical roots. The bears speak and encourage you to manage the world around you. You are rewarded for restoring balance to the valley by being able to recycle things you don’t need. Your main resource in the game, gold, also doesn’t matter that much; if it ever slips into the negative, nothing bad ever happens. You must just work to raise it back up. There is no lose condition in the game.
In many respects it is similar to the Gaiaism philosophy that all living beings are connected, each relying and depending on each other in order to maintain a peaceful coexistence. You help Shane with his nihilism and depression, Sebastian with his ability to express and accept affection, Sam with his dreams, Kent with his problems, Leah with her ambitions, Haley with her generosity and narcissism, or even simple goals like Penny’s idea of a quiet domestic life.
Whether it is the addicted, lost, or scorned, everyone is welcome and everyone can have a home in Stardew Valley. No one embodies this more than Robin who just wants a simple life. Whether it is her own house or her own boat during the Dance of the Moonlight Jellies, Robin builds it herself. The feel of wood grain, the smell of lacquer, the stickiness of stain, the thrum of the saw, and the bite of the axe. Robin doesn’t charge you nearly enough for your house upgrades because it is not about the money. Woodworking is what she loves and she lives in a place where barterism, kindness, family, and friendship substitute so many of life's modern problems and inconveniences.
Friendship increases in the game aren’t just a measurement of achievements, a means of getting more recipes, or more candles lit on a grave. You are making friends and getting to know these people for who they are and everyone’s life is bettered because of it. The amount of love I’ve seen for Linus is just staggering. Shane, in all of his melancholy and despite him not being a suitor in the original version of the game, is loved by so many. I know some despise Haley, but I love that I was able to show her what kindness can do for people.
You are in a gentle and loving place, and you are loved.
What a better place for a god to reside? A quiet town filled with peace and love, seeped in nature and the old magics of yore. A loving mate, a family to raise. Land to share with those that forage from its bounty. It’s all she needs.
Robin’s role in all of this? She desires neither worship nor admiration. She is just a friend. A god, certainly, but a friend first and foremost who is just settling down in a quiet town looking for a little peace.
​
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Image by MagicallyClueless

AOT pt. 1 “Rise and shine,baby,”Ymir heard Historia whisper in her ear.Ymir opened her eyes,flipping onto her other side and staring into her lover’s eyes.Historia’s short,blonde hair stayed so perfect even after sleeping,and her complexion glowed in the sunlight that flowed through the large window in their bedroom. “How do you stay so perfect,Historia?Your aura is so pristine while my aura is like a cloudy thunderstorm,”Ymir said grumpily. “Well I'll let you know that I happen to love thunderstorms,”Historia said,smiling.She pulled Ymir closer to her until she couldn't pull Ymir any closer. And in her current form,she couldn't pull Ymir towards her as close as she previously could,seeing as how Ymir’s well rounded stomach made a barrier between them.Ymir sighed and closed her eyes as Historia giggled. “I had forgotten they were right there!”Historia said smiling.She kissed Ymir and then slid down the bed,to where her face was lined up with Ymir’s big girth. “How are my babies doing?”Historia said,talking to their children and placing her left hand atop the side of Ymir’s belly,which faces upwards because they were laying on their sides.Historia brought her face closer to Ymir’s stomach and applied soft kisses to its surface,while stroking it with her left hand.Ymir was known in the army to be a bit of a hard case,but whenever she was in an intimate situation with Historia,her hard shell completely melted because of her affection for her wife. Even with Historia being royalty,being the Queen of all the walls,she was not afraid to show off that Ymir was her bride,in fact,she was very proud of it.She constantly brought her to public events the queen was supposed to attend and immediately wanted to announce Ymir’s pregnancy to the public when they first found out. “I can't believe we’re having a baby!We have to tell everyone that you're expecting!” Ymir grinned at reminiscing on Historia’s excitement. Historia was so excited to see their children,and while Ymir was equally excited to meet their children,she liked how things were right now.She wasn't having to go out on survey corps missions and be used as a weapon for the military.Her lover was always by her side 100%,comforting her through her pregnancy and tending to her needs.Ymir always insisted that Historia should focus on her job as queen but Historia said that she would never forgive herself if she took her wife for granted and didn't pay attention to her.While Ymir still believed Historia should focus on her duties as queen over her duties as a wife,she would never oppose to having more time to spend with her lover. As Historia showed love to their unborn children,Ymir placed her hand on top of Historia’s,guiding it to the spots of movement.They could feel kicks and punches in various areas,and each new one they felt made them smile wide.When they first found out about Ymir’s pregnancy,they thought she was expecting just one child.But that eventually proved false as when she hit 4 months, the doctor felt around and decided that she was bearing triplets.There was a slight belief that she was carrying quadruplets, but the doctor eventually confirmed that she was just pregnant with triplets. “I'm just now realizing how big your belly has been getting,Ymir,”Historia remarked,kissing her wife’s childbearing girth. Ymir smiled, “Yeah it's becoming a real big one,”she said as she traced her finger across it’s soft surface.It was quite firm and swollen,taut and stretched yet her stomach still kept a very smooth and soft surface,even if it appeared as the size of a beach ball.Historia pressed the side of her face up to the front of Ymir’s belly,closing her eyes with a smile spread across her lips,the babies kicking at her cheek.Historia was so comfortable being in her lover’s atmosphere,right next to her children that she quickly fell asleep still clutching her wife’s gravid stomach. Ymir smiled and a small tear leaked out her eye.She remembered how she had turned her back on Historia and left the city years back.She ached to see Historia again and when she came back,she ended up being forgiven by her,much to her surprise.She thought she would be resented by everyone,but everyone welcomed her back into the walls with open arms.Historia immediately embraced Ymir when she came back with the survey corps,locking her lips to Ymir’s and taking in her warmth. Eventually,the two got married and got to the position that they were right now.Madly in love,the two most important figures in the kingdom and expecting a family.Ymir closed her eyes and wrapped her arm around her belly,reaching her hand over its surface to place it on Historia’s head.She stroked Historia’s hair and smiled,eventually falling back asleep,able to forget her messy past because she was in bed with the four people she loved most.
Hitch was standing at her home’s sink,cleaning off the dishes and drying them.She was still in the nightgown she had adorned for bed last night,she didn't see any reason to change when she was only doing dishes and it was hours until she had to run errands.She took the stiff and wet sponge and dragged it across the surface of one of the dirty plates,clearing It of any residue.While in the midst of washing the silverware,she felt an arm curl around her back and slither up to her stomach where it’s feminine hand stopped and kept itself in that position.She felt a head lean onto her shoulders,it’s soft,long hair brush softly against her neck. “How’s my baby doing?”The person said to Hitch. “Well I'm feeling pretty good,just tired is all,”Hitch replied,turning around to face the person that had addressed her. It was Sasha Braus,a girl Hitch had met when Hitch served in the military police and when Sasha served in the survey corp.Hitch had been made to go out onto a survey corps mission because they were low on personnel.Hitch had no idea what went on out there and was at a huge risk because she had no experience,so Sasha had always kept close to Hitch,protecting her in case she got into any serious trouble.Since they were always so close to each other when on missions outside the walls,they eventually grew closer and closer and eventually fell in love after many conversations and intimate moments out in the field.Sasha proposed to Hitch out on the mission,and when they got back they ecstatically got married to each other as soon as they possibly could.Since then,they lived inside the first wall,where most of the more well off people could be found.Seeing as how Sasha was a hero of the survey corps and Hitch had once been a member of the military police,they had been granted a very good pay from the Queen because of both their services. Sasha was about 5 foot 6,which Hitch also happened to be.She was wearing a khaki colored short sleeve t-shirt,the type of shirt they got back when they were active in the survey corps and a pair of pyjama pants,brown and cut off around the ankles.She had reddish-brown hair,and it was styled in a thick ponytail behind her head with bangs covering her forehead.She had light brown eyes,and a cute face.When looking at her body,she had about c-cup breasts and her thighs were curvier than they were about 8 months ago,which may have something to do with Sasha’s pregnancy. The part of her body I neglected to mention was that she has a very round,swollen pregnant stomach,which her shirt attempted to cover but could really only cover the area above her protruding navel,leaving the rest of her belly bare and visible.She was about seven and a half months with triplets,and her belly was looking more bulbous and globular than ever before.Sasha placed her right hand on the exposed part of her stomach,rubbing it back and forth,trying to soothe the fierce kicks erupting from that side. “How are the babies doing,my love?”Hitch said,softly pressing two hands to the taut yet smooth surface of her partner’s gravid midsection,it’s large presence being further accentuated by the ridiculously small shirt that barely covered any part of Sasha’s belly. “Slightly active,but they aren't hurting.How about you?How are my baby’s babies doing?”Sasha said,pressing her left hand to Hitch’s round,orbicular pregnant stomach, which too held three inhabitants.Hitch had been pregnant for the same amount of time as Sasha had,albeit Sasha's belly was slightly bigger.The nightgown flowing down her body was being stretched by her sizeable girth,pressing against the gown’s fabric,straining it and causing it to accentuate the curve of her round middle. Hitch had wavy,light brown hair which went to about chin length.Her eyes were bright green and she weighed 53 kg before the pregnancy,but with all the extra weight her big belly put on her now it was likely double that size.Hitch was quite lazy at times,but her pregnancy really kicked her responsibility and maternal instincts into full drive,which meant she cleaned up the house daily and often went out for all the errands for her and Sasha. Sasha was an expert archer and her most loved three aspects of her life are these,in order: 1.Her and Hitch’s unborn children,who she loved being pregnant with but also couldn't wait to see them. 2.Hitch,the woman she devoted the rest of her life to being with. 3.Potatoes.Sasha loves potatoes. No one can really pinpoint why Sasha has such a profound love for the things.Most people don't think potatoes are very tasty while raw but she would take a potato that was uncooked and just start eating into it.Whenever she would see a potato,she’d start drooling and immediately feel gravitated towards it.Hitch didn't understand why,but it did add more weight to Sasha in all of the right places and that is something Hitch would never complain about,especially when they’re active in intimate sexual contact fairly frequently. “Hey,Hitch,can you go out and buy us some potatoes please?”Sasha said with a hopeful look on her eyes.Hitch sighed, “I will if you come with me.I haven't been able to spend a lot of time with you this week,”Hitch said,grabbing a grocery bag in one hand and stroking her belly with the other. “Well of course I'll come with you,anything for my beautiful wife,”Sasha said,kissing Hitch and pushing her belly up against her wife’s bringing them closer together.Hitch’s face turned red as Sasha stared into her lover’s eyes.She whispered into her wife’s ear, “When we get home,the potatoes can wait for a while because you always come first on the menu for me,”Hitch was beet red,her pelvis became wet and her nipples stood up from her partner’s intoxicating words and presence.Sasha kissed Hitch and linked her hand with hers.Sasha walked gingerly out the door with Hitch holding her hand next to her,still stuck in the brief moment back in their house. “Is something wrong,baby?”Sasha said to Hitch,concerned.Hitch snapped out of it and replied, “W-what?Y-yeah!O-of course everything is f-fine w-why wouldn't it be?”Sasha was still slightly doubtful but she decided to listen to her wife and not bother her about it. Hitch hadn't felt emotion like that from Sasha in a while,so it had immediately flooded her with feelings of euphoria and arousal.It was a clever and very strategic tease,getting Hitch turned on right before leaving for the store so that when they got back it would feel amazing.Hitch wanted to pounce on her lover like a tiger, right then and there in the middle of the street.But since it was a public place and Sasha had planned such an articulate and genius move back in the house,it wouldn't feel right. So Hitch decided to wait for the sensation because waiting would make it so,so much sweeter.
Annie stared out one of the windows in her home,staring out at the streets,with people moving in and out of shops and houses.She noticed a young pregnant woman shopping with her spouse and she smiled.The woman made Annie think about her very own children,the sleeping babies in her womb right then.She slid her right hand onto the side of her round girth.She was said to be expecting twins,but with the size her stomach was she wouldn't be surprised if it ended up being more,probably triplets.Her blue eyes stared at her belly,its width and length concealing her feet from coming into view,Not even her toes poked out.Annie often thought it was funny,and tried her best to find her feet but her gravid stomach was quite large and prevented that. Annie heard a voice deeply exhale from behind her and say, “A-Annie,can you help me?”Annie turned her head to see the person’s troubles,moving a strand of her blonde hair out of eyesight. It was her wife,Mikasa,struggling to exit the rocking chair she was inhabiting,her big gravid belly stopping her from making it out of the chair’s clutches.Annie smiled and laughed as her wife’s inability to get out of the chair,finding it charming and cute.Annie walked over to Mikasa,who was not amused and was still sitting down. “So can you stop messing around and help me please?”Mikasa said,clearly frustrated,which made Annie find her even cuter. “Okay,okay,I'll help you Mika,”Annie replied,calling Mikasa by the nickname she had given her when they started dating,which Mikasa used to find annoying but came around to it eventually. Mikasa had short,black hair that went down to her neck,along with a eye color that could be described as a mesmerizing,deep grey.She was a very beautiful woman,standing at 170 cm and was 68 kg before becoming pregnant.She had thin,pink lips that Annie loved to lock lips with. But most prominent of Mikasa’s figure was her big stomach.And oh boy was it a big one.Out of all previously mentioned women,Mikasa took the cake for sheer size and girth,Her stomach more taut and swollen then the rest of the women’s childbearing midsections.It rested under Mikasa’s white nightgown,which stretched to its absolute limits every time Her stomach moved.If she leaned back and placed her hands on her lower back,you could see and feel the gown pushing itself it it's boundaries,the fabric would stretch and hug tightly to Mikasa’s stomach,the full curve of her gestating middle being fully accentuated and expressed.The reason her stomach was so annular and orbicular was because of how replete with offspring her womb was.She was carrying five children,quintuplets,in her pregnancy and it really came out in her belly. “Ok,come on,let's help you up honey,”Annie said smiling as Mikasa still upset with Annie reluctantly took Annie’s hand.After getting Mikasa a slight distance off of the seat,Annie wrapped her left arm around Mikasa’s back,assisting in lifting her up.The two lovers sides pressed together as Annie helped the very pregnant Mikasa out of the chair.Once they were both on their feet,their sides were touching,their large stomach masses side-by-side.Mikasa’s was longer and wider,but Annie still had a great stomach,which is why she believed she was having triplets. “Look at your belly,Annie,it’s really big yet in the best way.It’s perfectly taut and swollen,and skin so smooth you can't help but ran your hands across it.But look at me,”Mikasa said poking her massive midsection, “I look like a mountain,”Mikasa said,sadly.Annie laughed which made Mikasa turn her head away from Annie,tears forming in her eyes. “Guess I can't count on the woman I love for reassurance,”Mikasa said with a mix of sadness and anger in her voice,tears running down her cheeks.She tried to pull away from Annie,but Annie pulled her back and turned her head so she was facing Annie. “Mikasa,I love you.Do you really think I don't find you attractive?”Annie said to Mikasa,concern in her eyes. “W-well,”Annie stopped her by placing a finger on her lips. “Baby,I laughed because of how ridiculous of a claim that is to me.Here,let me show you what I mean,”Annie said,wrapping her arm back around Mikasa and walking side by side with her into their bathroom. They stared into the mirror,standing side-by-side.Annie grabbed Mikasa by her upper arm and turned her sideways.She gripped Mikasa’s arms,showing Mikasa she was determined to prove to her wife that she believed she was beautiful. “For example,look at your face Mikasa,I've never seen a more beautiful complexion.And your hair is just the type of length I like,dark black and going down to your neck,”despite being 153 cm tall as opposed to Mikasa’s 170,and being less pregnant than Mikasa is,Annie when determined had just as strong of a demeanor and aura. “And look at this bosom!I have NEVER seen a more ample pair of breasts,tender and sensitive,full and perky.I could play with these gifts from the gods all day!”Annie said,cupping and groping Mikasa’s breasts with excitement and emotion.Mikasa moaned slightly,her face turning red,gritting her teeth to refrain from screaming out of pure pleasure.Her wife’s soft hands touching her rack and expertly handling her tits caused her nipples to stick out and her vagina to become wet. “Yes!Even better,just feel these nipples!So excited and intrigued!”Annie said with enthusiasm,softly circling her thumbs over and around Mikasa’s sensitive nipples. Mikasa was moaning quietly,smiling and staring at her wife’s show of affection to her heavily gravid form. “And feel this cake,”Annie said,feeling Mikasa’s thighs then grabbing her asscheeks. “Round,and thick and so much fun to hold onto at night or play with whenever.Your time in the survey corps gave you megs curves and this pregnancy has boosted that by a huge mile,”Mikasa blushed deep red at her partner’s sexual touch and words. “And finally,this bulbous,orbicular,annular,massive pregnant belly,”Annie said with a crazy look. “It's so round,taut and swollen yet skin so smooth,busting out of your nightgown which is being strained under its sheer girth,”Annie said.Mikasa noticed the look in her wife’s eyes, “I-I get it Annie,you love my body and all but I'm a little worried,you seem more enthusiastic than usual,”Mikasa said smiling and nervously laughing,Annie caressing and examining her pregnant stomach. “Why would you be worried love,I would never hurt you,I'm just…”Annie closed her eyes for a second and placed a kiss on Mikasa’s round stomach. “...obsessed,”She finished,standing up straight. She suddenly stood on her tiptoes,grabbing onto Mikasa’s shoulders and bring her up to eye level.She locked lips with Mikasa,kissing her wife deeply.Mikasa was caught off guard,but decided to close her eyes and take in the moment.Annie stepped down back to her normal height. “Let’s get out of this bathroom baby,there’s barely enough space in there for are pregnant selves,”Annie said with a devilish grin.Mikasa’s cheeks were red and her body was raging.Annie had got to Mikasa in all the right places that her sex drive was at full scale,her pregnancy fueled hormones making them flame up even more. Annie was petite,her big round stomach being accentuated over everything else due to her short stature.Her blonde hair was so mesmerizing,her blue eyes like the ocean,her ample chest like two melons.Annie walked with Mikasa back into their bedroom,where they stopped next to the bed.Annie’s hormones were also raging like Mikasa’s.The couple was in their collective eight month phase and were more excited than ever.Annie was wearing a tight,white t-shirt that clung to her breasts,the shape of her sensitive and stiff nipples poking through the fabric.The shirt attempted to go past her belly button but failed,sticking to her stomach,making it look ever so larger.She had slept not in panties that night but in just a g-string,which rode right down her buttcrack and showed off the growth her backside had gone through since her pregnancy. The whole scene of Annie standing in next to the bed,belly,breasts and butt so perfectly highlighted by her kinky choice of clothes was too much for Mikasa to manage.She rushed in with her hands and grabbed her wife’s breasts,then went in for a deep kiss.Annie kissed back,pushing her lover’s arms further onto her body,encouraging Mikasa to keep touching her. Annie pushed Mikasa slightly away.She grabbed the bottom of the short shirt and hoisted it up over her head,tossing it aside onto the floor.She looped her fingers around the cloth of the g-string and pulled it down as far as her pregnant body allowed.She had to stop right above the knees,which prompted her to lay on the bed and say, “Aw,I can't get these all the way off,can you help me Mikasa?”Annie said in a sensual voice.Mikasa nodded and touched Annie’s legs,grabbing onto the g-string.She slid it off of Annie slowly,her soft hands gliding over Annie’s smooth skin.The g-string came off,and was very quickly cast aside by Mikasa.Annie sat up on the bed,and got onto her knees on it. Now,Annie was exposed in her full nude and heavily pregnant glory,bulbous belly stuck outwards,demanding attention be shown to it.Mikasa touched a hand to Annie’s stomach,then dragged it upwards,running it across Annie’s right breast,forcing a small moan out of her.Her hand moved up from the breast and onto Annie’s cheek,where it grabbed her and pulled her into a passionate kiss with her lover.Mikasa pulled away from her forceful kiss,then turned her back to face Annie. “Could you help me with this,my love?”Mikasa said,attempting to sound more sexy and alluring.And for Annie,well it was definitely working because her nipples were harder than bedrock. “Of course I will!”Annie said with emotion as she grabbed the nightgown and ripped the back of it in two.She turned Mikasa back around,and had Mikasa pull her arms out of the sleeves of the night gown.Annie tossed the ruined clothing article out of the way and sat back,appearing to be in a state of hypnosis. Annie took in Mikasa’s gravid and wondrous form.Her huge and round stomach was exposed,so big her body could barely support it while standing.Her breasts were so tender and full,more than just ample.Her thighs were so thick and her butt so round and juicy.Mikasa’s face was looking red as a tomato,and Annie loved it. “We are about to have a wonderful time,my love,” Annie said.

Hi, I am currently living in a house in Mississauga, but am hoping to move to an apartment in Toronto later in 2018. I'm furnishing my current room though, and don't want to buy something I won't be able to take with me later on.
I get that it would be hard to say if a room is too small or big when I haven't seen it, or my price range, etc. But I was wondering if I can get some kind of estimate?
I was planning on buying this desk (It's 140 cm (4.5 feet) in width), an office chair, and a queen sized bed. Would all of these fit in the average room apartment in Toronto?

I NEED TO DOWNSIZE. I've got to get rid of a huge arse table and an inflatable queen size bed.
Antique Chinese Glass Top Coffee Table
This coffee table is too huge for my apartment. It's practically brand new, and now it could be yours.
It's a baller table. It has a glass top, and a wooden layer underneath that features a Chinese double lucky design with bats for good luck! 8888888
Either part of the double tops can be used. You can have it with straight glass, or just the wooden design part, or both! It's so versatile!
The table also has 4 drawers, and 4 slide out corner drawers. It's pretty cool. SO MUCH SPACE FOR BITS AND BOBS. And you can use it for display purposes too.
It's a one-of-a-kind table. The colour is a dark maroon-brown. I have no idea what type of wood it is, maybe oak? I have no idea. It weighs a tonne though. Very sturdy table.
Dimensions (cm): 119 (length) x 80.7 (width) x 46 (height)
Gumtree link for photos: http://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/prahran/other-antiques-art-collectables/antique-chinese-glass-top-coffee-table/1134169093?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=socialbuttons
Queen Size Air Mattress/Bed
It's blue, and the top has that flocking velour type surface. Nice and buttery.
Once inflated, it sits about 20 to 30cm high, about the width of a normal mattress.
Mattress comes with foot pump. and in that carry bag. Makes your life 1000% easier.
I didn't take a photo of it inflated. Dont make me go through that hassle. You know what an inflated mattress looks like.
Gumtree link for photos: http://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/prahran/beds/queen-size-air-mattress-bed/1134140000?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=socialbuttons
Pick up from Prahran, come get it all ASAP.