Rest® ad: Hot Sleeper Journal

I stole a comforter from a hotel in Charleston while I was in town for my niece’s wedding last spring. I'm not proud of it. The general manager emailed me three days after we checked out. It was the third night of the trip. We had been at the hotel for three nights and I was sleeping the way people sleep in commercials. Out cold. Not a single wake-up, not one leg kicked out from under the comforter looking for cool air. The kind of sleep I used to have before I turned 40-something and my nights turned into a hot sweaty mess— at home I'm 46, I sleep on my side, and most nights I'm up by 3:47am peeling the comforter off, then pulling it back on, then off again, already doing the math on how wrecked I'm going to be tomorrow. On the first night, I thought it was the mattress. On the second night, I thought it was the wine. On the third night, I lay there at 7:30am, having slept eight hours uninterrupted, and I thought: it's the comforter. I never woke up too hot. I needed this comforter. No 2am wake-up, kicking the comforter off and pulling it back on. No lying there doing math about how many hours of sleep I had left. I've been what I'd call a hot sleeper for a while now — I run warm, especially at night, for reasons I've mostly stopped trying to diagnose — and this was the first time in longer than I want to admit that I hadn't woken up hot. I checked for the tag. There wasn't one. I called the front desk. "Hi, I'm in 214 — can you tell me what brand your comforters are? I'd love to get one." Long pause. "I'm so sorry, that's actually one of our proprietary amenities, we're not able to share the supplier." I asked if they sold them in the gift shop. They didn't. I asked if there was a way to be notified if they ever did. There wasn't. I hung up and told my husband. He didn't even look up from his book. "You're gonna take it, aren't you?" "I am absolutely going to take it." "You know they're gonna know it was you." "They can keep the incidentals deposit or something" That morning, after breakfast, I rolled the comforter up small, and stuffed it into the bottom of my suitcase under my shoes. My heart was racing. My husband watched the entire operation from the bed, laughing, occasionally offering unhelpful commentary like "maybe use the laundry bag, it's more discreet" and "I want it on record I said this was a bad idea." We checked out by 11am. Flew back home. Unpacked the next day at 2pm. I put the comforter on my bed. I slept perfectly for another 2 nights. Then on the third day, an email showed up. Subject line: "A Small Matter From Your Recent Stay." It was from the general manager. Polite. Almost amused, honestly. Dear Mrs. Santana, Our housekeeping team flagged, during checkout inventory for room 214, that the comforter was unaccounted for. I want to be clear that we're not assuming anything by writing — items get left behind, packed by accident, or simply misplaced more often than guests realize. That said, if it is the case that you wanted to take it home with you, we would like the opportunity to offer it to you formally. For what it's worth, that particular comforter is custom-made for us by a supplier we work with exclusively, so it isn't something we're able to offer for purchase through the hotel. If you're willing to let me know either way, I can close this out on my side with no issue at all. Warmly, Carolyn, General Manager I'd been sleeping like a different person on a comforter I'd stuffed in my suitcase, and now the general manager of a hotel I'd stayed at for one weekend had emailed me — not with a bill, not with a warning, just genuinely and kindly asking whether I'd taken it. I showed my husband. He read it twice and then laughed so hard he had to sit down. "You got caught." I wrote back and confessed. I offered to pay for it. They said not to worry about it, called it a parting gift, and even refunded the incidentals deposit. They really wanted that five-star review. Then in July, at a dinner with my girl friends, the hotel story came up — because at this point it's the only genuinely interesting thing I've ever done — and my friend Jen who's an interior designer, said "I think I know the mystery brand of your stolen comforter. Look up Rest, they make the Evercool Cooling Comforter. Tell me if I'm right." I looked it up. Read the description. It wasn't just "cooling" in the vague way everything claims to be cooling — it actually explained why: the fibers are ultr-thin and made for pulling heat away from your body heat instead of just trapping it under the covers. A lab test found Evercool to be cooler than silk, cotton, or bamboo. I didn't know that was something you could actually put a number on. "You could be right, Jen." I wasn't sure if it was the same one but I ordered it because I wasn't thrilled about sleeping with a stolen hotel comforter. It arrived on a Tuesday. I put it on the bed that night. It was cold, even cooler than my precious stolen comforter, and it was still cold when I woke up at 7am for work. I slept through the whole night without a drop of sweat. Without waking up hot once. Only turned a few times as I was falling asleep, then out like a light until I got up for work. About two weeks in, my husband rolled over one morning and said, "You've stopped doing the thing." "What thing?" "The 3am huffing and kicking thing." "Yea I sleep like a baby now that all your body heat isn't getting trapped under the covers" which I was just teasing him about, but it's true I sleep like an angel now. I'm less anxious when I wake up knowing I'm full rested and I'm in a way better mood when I get good sleep. I can't believe I went so long waking up cranky everyday when this comforter was just out there existing without me knowing. It's also machine washable, which matters, because I am not about to hand-wash a comforter for the rest of my life the way I apparently would have for a stolen hotel one if I'd never found anything better. I still think about that hotel sometimes. I hope whoever's in 214 is sleeping okay. If you are reading this and you're the kind of person who wakes up hot, or sweaty, tosses and turns, sticks out limbs from the covers… I understand you completely, and I'd like to save you the email from the general manager of a hotel. It's Rest. It ships free, machine washable, and comes with a 1 year warranty. Right now they're running an end of summer sale and it's the biggest sale I've seen from them yet. I just grabbed another set for the guest room. Sometimes I go to sleep there when I'm sick so it'll be nice to have. — Marina, 46, Texas P.S. — My husband still brings up the hotel story at dinner parties. He now also brings up that I "finally parted with it and just bought the real thing," which is true, but it was an easy choice. P.P.S. — Get the bundle with the comforter and sheet set together. A lot of heat can get released through the comforter but when I got the sheet set I could feel the difference in how much cooler I was underneath too. P.P.P.S — I have not been back to that hotel. I want to. But I'm sure my picture is taped to the back of the front desk so the staff can see who to call security on.