Tag Archive 'IKEA'

Feb 09 2010

IKEA!

ikea instruction manual

Oh IKEA, I hate you, I love you.

Like most people on the planet, within a week of moving to my new place I found myself making the pilgrimage to the blue and yellow monolith. I check my pride at the door, get on my belly and suck that IKEA teat like a hungry piglet. I’m pretty sure I know exactly what a crack whore feels like when she’s “working.” (That’s two posts in a row that mention whores, if you are keeping score. More whores in 2010!)

I feel equal parts shame and excitement as I walk through those doors and the sweet smell of cinnamon rolls and particle board wraps around my body like the ghosts in Poltergeist. Shopping at IKEA is like telling the world, “I’m poor, I’m lazy, I like ümlaüts and I want my stüff to look like your stüff.” I spend most of my time convincing myself that, “It looks OK, right? It’s kind of cool looking, right? It doesn’t look too IKEA, right?”

I would love to sit here on my throne and criticize all my fellow IKEA shoppers as middle-of-the-road, boring, predictable, suburban, wannabe hipsters but how can I when I’m walking around filling my cart with Flürgens, Gråbenfüks and Lüäöküöås just like they are. I want to feel superior, but as I type this from my IKEA Vika Grevsata desk it’s not that easy. I used to be cool. I used to be in a band.

But don’t think the pain ends when you get home with your pile of vaguely stylish products. Oh no silly pants, that’s when you get to decipher Swedish hieroglyphics and spend the next 7 hours assembling your crappy bookcases.

Is it würth it?

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