Happy May Day, my communist brothers. To remember the day we hosted my nephew Chris for dinner. He’s visiting from California with his girlfriend and we decided to celebrate the workers of the world like we did back in the old country…crab cakes and beer.
Swedish meatballs and affordable furniture for all the workers of the world!
As often happens when family gets together the conversation naturally turns to IKEA. IKEA’s one of my favorite stores, so filled with hope and promise…truly an uplifting experience even if it’s impossible to turn their carts when fully loaded. The carts, that is – I’ve never shopped at IKEA when I was fully loaded.
Chris asked, “Hey, have you heard the IKEA song?” This may have been a ruse to give himself the opportunity to pull out his new iPhone and play the song through it but it failed. The lyrics were difficult to understand so it was TiVo to the rescue. In short order we had the video up on the TV, the family gathered ’round, and it was good:
I have several Billy bookcases myself, I noted with pride.
“What’s this about IKEA banned commercials’”, I think, eyeing a related search result. Click first, ask questions later is what I always say*. Watch it below and meet me after, or navigate away now because the rest of the discussion won’t make sense.
When I wrote “the family gathered ’round” I meant all of us, including my 3 kids (ages 12, 10, and 7). The only thing that saved me from having to come up with a good explanation for the 3rd commercial was the kids themselves. “It’s a missile!” one of them announced and they proceeded to crack up about the little boy playing with a missile. “Yes”, all the adults agreed, “a missile!”
Is that an IKEA product I missed as I aimlessly wandered the displays of “six rooms of furniture in 250 square feet!”? The “håppybringûn” perhaps? “Climákks”? “Steêlydån”?
Speaking of IKEA names (smooth, ain’t I?), check out the “Swedish Furniture Name Generator“. At first I thought it was a cute idea, even if I ended up as an uninspired product.
I spend the best years of my life sitting on my ass and I come back as a chair. Just great.
Plugging in my daughter’s name, though, gave me a more worrisome product.
Translation: Swedish boys entering my yard will beaten with my large collection of Allen wrenches and tiny pencils.
Really? Don’t I have enough to worry about without you throwing that out there, not-IKEA website? If it’s any consolation to me, my stepdaughter (now 21) told me tonight that she still remembers what I said when she got her first menstrual cycle. I told her on the first anniversary of her cycle I’d bake her a red velvet cake using my hemispherical cake pan…you know, the one that looks like a 3-D period.
Wow, and I always thought she never listened to a word I said. This is great! I just need to find the right thing to say to my daughter and…and…
Forget it. Any outcome depending on me saying the right thing will never come to pass. I guess I’ll just have to stock up on lingonberry wine and ride out the red storm rising the best I can.
* I’ve never said that. Ever.