Cheryl made a trip across the bay to visit the Tampa IKEA store a while ago. A visit with the Swedish retailer usually lasts a full day and this one fit the pattern.
Don’t you just love IKEA? Have you hugged a Swede today?
I stayed home and reacquainted myself with regret.
Inner John: Hey John, you remember regret don’t you?
Public John: Yeah, we go way back.
Inner John: Didn’t you two hook up back in fifth grade… something to do with a lesson in politics?
Public John: I lost.
Inner John: Didn’t everyone on your campaign staff vote for the other guy too?
Public John: I hear alcohol kills brain cells. YOU WANNA GO?!? LETS GO!
I spent the afternoon in a funk.
What’s wrong with me? I’m (allegedly) a dude. IKEA should be my blood adversary… Vader vs young Skywalker, Mac vs Microsoft, comma vs period. Instead of counting my lucky stars, pieces of the retail sky are falling awfully close to my peace of mind, threatening my fragile sense of wellbeing.
Maybe I’m overstating the remorse a bit….
A friend of mine at work would say I should be required to turn in my “man card.” I would reply: “I don’t think I was ever issued one, but I’m pretty sure I haven’t missed much.”
Anyway, now you know the set up. I’ll wager you’re so close to the edge of your seat you’d fall off with the slightest breeze or release of gas.
Cheryl came home with a shoe rack… for me!
I’ll give you a moment to pick yourself up off the floor. Lying sprawled down there is unseemly for a person of your station.
This is uncharted territory (for me). Not only is this my first shoe rack, it’s the first time I’ve ever considered the concept of order on my side of the closet. The only evidence of organization is two relatively neat piles: one for tee-shirts I haven’t worn in five (plus) years, and one for my hat collection.
If not for the physical laws of this universe, shirts and hats would live in harmony. It turns out it’s damn near impossible to make a single, narrow, free-standing pile of shirts and hats more than four feet tall.
It’s a shame, I know.
Otherwise, space is used on a first come, first served basis. It’s an under appreciated system. Stuff you use often tends to stay on top or towards the front where its easily found, while older, less desirable stuff goes into a kind of default storage.
But now, sweet Lord above, I’ve gotta find a place for a shoe rack. The system is lost, I tells ya!
Where once there was sweet chaos there’s a little bit of order.
You want some order?!?
No, not really.
YOU WANT SOME ORDER?!?
I said no. You don’t have to yell.
YOU CAN’T HANDLE SOME ORDER!
Sadly, I think you may be right.
I should’ve gone to IKEA and picked out my own little treat.
And so we come full circle.
Got regret?
I lived for years in Canada’s far north. When I moved south, I ended up in what was a huge city for me, Vancouver, and one of my early shopping trips to furnish my apartment was to IKEA. It had a path painted on the floor so you didn’t lose your way, it was so large. I was overwhelmed, so over whelmed that at the path’s end, trying desperately to find a washroom just to escape the magnitude of it all, I mistakenly went into the Men’s. Scared some poor fellow almost to death in this techy age of gender etiquette as he backed almost through the door in his rush to leave, thinking he was in the wrong place. All because of IKEA! Your blog was fun! TY
You didn’t go to IKRA!?!?!? I always get the gravlax, but am sorely tempted to get the Swedish Meatballs with LINGONBERRIES… so I get a jar of lingonberries to go for on my peanut butter sandwiches.
In my teensy efficiency apartment I have 6 BILLY bookcases (5 birch, 1 black) (floor to ceiling storage without taking up much room; 2 walls are lined with them), 2 black SKRUVSTA swivel chairs on casters, a dark brown BJURTSA dining table (19″x35″), an absolutely phenomenal black LED STOCKHOLM floor/reading lamp(you really should get one–and so should your Dad), a DAVE laptop stand, and a way too cool ORANGE chair w/footstool.
O.K. The orange was a mistake. I ordered grey and they gave me orange but I love it. it. I don’t see it in the newest cataloge, but it tilts and swivels on a pedestal. It’s a solid foam eggish chair but is not too, too huge.
When people come into my tiny domicile, they are amazed–thanks pretty much to (drum roll) IKEA!
What’s not to love about IKEA?
Teensy and efficiency may seem to be redundant terms, but at 167 ft sq it is cozy. But with 8 ft of window facing south with a view up the Kiskimenetas River it is light and panoramic.
Love
Aunt Suzy