When I check out of a hotel, I never complain. Why start off the day on the wrong foot? If something is wrong, I wait for the desk clerk to ask me, “was everything okay?” Interestingly enough, if I’m unhappy, the clerk doesn’t ask. On the other hand, when I’m satisfied, the clerk almost always asks. Hmmmm.....

I’m a big fan of roadside sculpture. One day I might do a column with photos of my favorites, including these: the giant gorilla who holds aloft a real Volkswagon Beetle at a car dealer near Middlebury VT; the giant RCA-Victor Nipper the Dog who sits on top of an office building in Albany NY; the giant barbell-pressing strongman at the York Barbell company in York PA; The giant blue termite (for an exterminator) in Providence RI. If there’s an interesting roadside sculpture in your town, let me know.

At the High Point market, most people don’t say “How are you,” or “Have a nice day.” Instead it’s “How’s your Market?” and “Have a nice Market.”

College towns always have a lot of bagel shops, cafes, bookstores, boutiques, and taverns. And one futon store. These towns are quite charming, and even though most of the businesses are local and individual, the towns are very similar to one another. On a similar note, it’s hard to remember what city or state you’re in when you’re at a mall. They all have JC Penney, Sears, Foot Locker, etc.

Speaking of malls, consider this before you rent a mall location. Whenever I visit a furniture or bedding store located in mall, the mall is usually a depressing dump with no traffic. My guess is that once a mall starts dying, the rents come down to the level that furniture and bedding retailers can afford. A key death sign to look for: mall stores being occupied by government offices such as Social Security or the Driver’s License Bureau, or an Outreach Center for veterans or seniors.

I don’t know why, but most cities still don’t have a Yellow Pages section for “Futons,” just the heading with a referral to look in some other category. The futon section exists in my home town’s directory, because I insisted on it years ago. Next time your Yellow Pages salesman comes around, I think you should do the same thing.

Is it a good thing or a bad thing when a competitor opens their store nearby? A good thing, I think. New competitors will have a hard time killing you off. If one or the other is going to die, it’s usually the new guy. Afterwards, you’ll see that the competition prompted you to improve your own store, and your business did not suffer from their presence or profit from their demise.

I must admit, I have seen a few examples of stores being killed off by new competitors, and justifably so. They were not satisfying their customers, and they went out of business. Competition simply sped up the process.

Observations from the highway: The bigger the RV, the older the driver; some cities are very difficult to drive in, especially Pittsburgh; in State College PA, the State Pen is down the road from Penn State; every state has its own shape for road signs. Most are square or circle shaped, but some are interesting such as map outlines (Ohio), landmarks (New Hampshire shaped like the Old Man in the Mountain), or state symbols (Pennsylvania shaped like a keystone).

Thanks to those who participated in our little contest last issue. A vintage Futon Life T-Shirt was awarded to Trish Rempen, the only participant to answer all fourteen questions correctly. Okay, go find the last issue, here are the answers: 1)n, 2)j, 3)b, 4)c, 5)h, 6)m, 7)e, 8)a, 9)d, 10)f, 11)k, 12)l, 13)i, 14)g.