Universal law of IKEA #28: No matter how hard you study the instructions; no matter how much you examine the different components, no matter how meticulously you sort out the different screws and bolt; you will always end up having to dismantle your 90% completed piece of furniture because you did something wrong and now the last bit doesn’t fit.
I wish I could blame this on IKEA, but to do so would be unfair. Inevitably I have missed the crucial grove, hole, or length difference that indicates that a particular piece goes a particular way. I spend a good ten minutes cursing them for selling me faulty stock until another sheepish examination of the instructions reveals my incompetence.
Throughout the whole process I am generally ably assisted by Amy, who insists on filling every possible hole and crevice with assorted screws regardless of any of my pleading directions. All in all I estimate that each item of IKEA furniture I have constructed has knocked approximately 6 months off my life. Never the less I keep on going back. IKEA has its detractors, but it’s cheap, reasonable quality, and available. We can’t all afford bespoke furniture crafted out of driftwood you know.
Our most recent purchase has been a dinning table and chairs. I have previously said that we don’t have room for such luxuries in our rather tiny house. The only way we thought it could be done would be to knock down a couple of walls. It was during a conversation about the cost of this that I had a flash of inspiration. If we moved this there and that here then we might just have room to squeeze one in by the window. And lo and behold once I had shifted a bit of furniture around and taken off the skin on one finger with the IKEA allan key we now have a fully fledged dining table and chairs. No doubt we will spend many a quality evening sitting round it as a family, forsaking the television in order to bond over shared meals, games of snakes and ladders, and tales of what we did that day. Either that or it will become yet another surface to cover with our piles of crap. Either way is good.
Of course this would not have been possible if I had not had the forethought to go out and buy my new Macbook – allowing me to relegate the PC to a corner of the room to be lifted on the table only on the odd occasion we need to use it. See, I told you it wasn’t a waste of money. All I need to do now is find a way to justify the purchase of a new HD giant screen TV and I’ll be set.
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 2:46 am
The last time I put something together I busted out the drill and hammer. Nothing like power tools.
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 3:16 am
We bought our kitchen table and chairs from Ikea this summer. Wouldn’t it be funny if we had the same one? How about a picture of your new dining room–
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 5:08 am
you’re book-smart, dan. you’ve got that going for you. ;o)
did you buy a flurg?! (we call everything from ikea a flurg. only there should be a umlaut over the U, i just don’t know how to type it.)
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 8:18 am
Its odd that just as you have got a table and chairs, we have taken to eating off our laps more (of course with a plate in between). I think that partly to do with the assorted crap that is all over the table which I have yet to sort – beware! Looking forward to seeing the new look Living Room. Of course it can double up as a den, more games to invent.
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 8:31 am
Power tools? I managed to scrape the skin off my finger with the bloody allen key, I’d have decapitated myself with a cordless drill.
It’s not a flurg Bon Bon, I think it was a Urgansplurganurgansplurg, but I could be wrong.
I doubt you got the same Table as us Deb, we had to choose a pretty small one to fit the room. We also got one that came with chairs because we’re tightwads like that.
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 8:38 am
We actually got a Jokkmokk, which is an impressive name in itself. It’s been a good purchase already so I’m really pleased Dan had that particular brain wave.
As for becoming a depository for stuff, we already have the fire guard Mum :)
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 6:11 pm
I miss Ikea. Used to live near one, but no longer. Now i widdle my furniture from fallen trees.
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on Jan 12th, 2007 at 11:11 pm
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on Jan 13th, 2007 at 2:17 am
Actually, Dan, our new kitchen table is 29 x 47 and looks remarkably similar to yours. Beech? Ours didn’t come with chairs, however.
The chairs we do have look a lot like yours, but with only one bar across the back rather than two.
Regarding Mitch’s comment, I’m pretty sure he meant “whittle.” I have now learned another interesting “English” word!
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on Jan 15th, 2007 at 4:34 am
No, I’m with you. What always gets me is putting together something where it’s got a front and a back side. I usually put the back side facing front and that screws up the whole project.
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on Jan 16th, 2007 at 9:51 am
AD
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on Jan 20th, 2007 at 2:55 pm
We also buy most of our stuff from IKEA and the worst thing to put together so far was a drawers and cupboard combo thingy. Oh it was awful – my wife and I divorced twice during it’s construction. I expected to see hieroglyphics inside it.
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on Jan 20th, 2007 at 3:02 pm
I’ve gone for the “don’t say anything until asked” approach when Dan starts constructing. I would go about it differently but have decided it unwise to suggest anything of the sort in a bid to retain my marriage.
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