indi vs. ikea
Yesterday bleukarma took me to Ikea, where I had never been before. She was excited about it in the way she gets excited about theme parks, which should have been both a preparation and a warning. Because, I swear to you (if you haven't been) the place is a theme park slash hands-on museum devoted to Swedish interior design. Where everything has funny names that I try to say with my limited understanding of Estonian pronunciation. This, of course, means I cannot behave or take anything seriously. I don't know how I still have friends, I really don't. But I think it entertains Bleu when I do this. She does encourage me.
"Bleu," I kept saying, in the little This Apartment Is Twenty-Five Square Feet! showrooms, "I think I made this house in the Sims."
How To Test A Couch:
First, sit on arm. Rolled-arm couches are mandatory on Planet Indi, both for sitting on and for hooking a leg over. If that is comfortable, flop back so that both knees are hooked over arm while torso and head are on couch. Stay there a while. Kick feet around, maybe. Then get up and sit normally on the couch. Then slouch like you're half asleep and watching a movie. Then kick off shoes and lie flat, like you're napping. Wriggle around a bit. Lastly, pull back-pillow out sideways behind head and read something. If after all of this you are comfortable, it is A Good Couch. If people look at you funny during this, look at them funny right back.
... Bleu disappeared while I was doing this. I am not sure why. I reckon, if I'm going to seriously consider buying a couch, I must do all the things on it that I would do on it at home. Except without itching myself.
A lot of this was looking at office stuff, because if things go well sometime between now and the distant future we will actually need one, and need to furnish it. Bleu likes furniture shopping anyway, so it worked out well. Mostly well.
Bleu wanted to find a filing cabinet. At one point I found a thing which was similar, but contained a stack of shallow drawers instead. I told her I needed it for our office, and she asked me why.
"So I can keep stuff in it," I told her, because to me this was plainly obvious, being that I am Gadget Girl and all.
She: "But it's not a filing cabinet!"
Me: "I don't need it for files, I need it for stuff."
She: "Like what?"
Me: "You know, stuff. Cos I'm stuff-girl. Box cutters. Permanent markers. Wire cutters. Duct tape. Ethernet cable...."
She: "Oh, okay."
Me: "... spare staples, masking tape, galvy, solder would be good too, ooh, I'll need some screwdrivers..."
She: "... okay?"
Me: "... and I'll probably want a pack of spare knife blades and some playing cards and some pliers, needle-nose and regular, memory cards, oh and one of those putty knife scraper things, and zip-ties, and dog treats, thumb drives, and then I need to put all the computer parts somewhere..."
She: "OKAY WE'LL GET YOU ONE."
Me: "I might need two. Do they have bigger ones?"
What I really need is a sonic screwdriver and a field jacket with pockets that are bigger on the inside.
She: "Look, it's a thing you put on the wall the router goes in!"
Me: "If you get that and expect me to do anything with your routers you are putting it in a place where I don't have to stand on an ergonomic chair to see inside it."
She: "And I can put pictures on top!"
Me: "No higher than here, okay?"
She: "Or potted plants."
Me: "THIS HIGH."
She: "Whatever. Sculpture!"
Then we found these little stools that looked like death-cap mushrooms. They had spinny tops. We sat on them and spun a little, and then I decided we needed to figure out just how spinny they are. So I centered myself, gave one good kick-off, and we started counting. It went around nine and one-quarter times, although it started to slow noticeably at seven. I told Bleu to try it, but she said no. Because she is smarter than I am when it comes to things like reality and how to not get dizzy in the middle of Ikea.
Oh god and the PROPS. So, you know, there we are, traipsing through the store and looking at things. Bleu, being practical, is looking at the furniture. I, being me, am dorking out over how they have REAL BOOKS in the bookcases and dude they're in SWEDISH and I wish I knew how to read Swedish. And all the little props, because I love stuff like that -- the little fake laptops and cellphones and stereos and things they put in. I swear, whenever any of y'all have kids, as soon as they are old enough for such things I am getting them a giant crate full of stuff like fake fruit and decorative cellphones. And I'm all, dude dude dude that is so adorable the little buttons are labeled even though they don't do anything, and Bleu's all - you dumbass, I'm looking at the bookcase your fancy fake stereo is on. Which is what we're here for. The furniture.
We had lunch in the overpriced cafeteria, and the Troopers got to play a bit too. Which is always fun.
I wound up grabbing a decent amount of stuff, including a fancy bed for Riley, who until now has been a very deprived dog indeed because she's been forced to sleep on either the throw rugs or the people furniture, and has never had a bed of her own. She loves the bed, but she will not be having with the matching fleece throw blanket that goes on the bed. So it goes. Maybe it's too staticky for her feet. This bed is huge. It was fifteen bucks, which is incredible for a Riley-sized bed. Since I'm me, I of course had to figure out if I could fit -- I DID THIS ONCE I GOT IT HOME, THANK YOU -- and in fact I do fit on that bed, if I tuck my knees to my chest and curl into a ball. Riley thought that me being in her bed was a brilliant idea, and she punched me in the forehead to tell me how funny it was. Ow.
Anyway! By the time we got to ring our stuff up something like five days had passed (being that time in Ikea does not flow at the same rate as time in the rest of the world) and I was all tired and boggled and putting mental diareses over every vowel in every word I said.
So I got to the register and dumped out all my stuff and the cashier lady decided I needed one of those big blue plastic bags they sell you because they don't actually offer shopping bags. She was very insistent, and I was very dazed, so it was pretty much a lost cause, except that they were folded up tiny and that confused me.
She, waving around this tiny folded-up blue thing: "FIFTY-NINE CENTS. REUSABLE. YOU CAN BRING IT BACK NEXT TIME AND USE IT AGAIN. TO CARRY YOUR THINGS OUT. JUST KEEP IT IN THE TRUNK OF THE CAR. THIS IS BETTER THAN THROWING AWAY PLASTIC BAGS. FIFTY. NINE. CENTS. AND IT'S YOURS FOREVER. BETTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT."
Me, gesturing to the Dog Bed of Enormitude: "No, just, um. Will everything fit in there?"
She took the little blue square of plastic, flicked her wrist, and it went FWOOMP and turned into a gihugeous plastic bag that I could probably fit in -- although I have not tried that yet. It's almost as big as Riley's bed, so I probably would fit in it, if I folded myself up small. I'll probably use it to drag all my blankets down to the laundrette, instead of shoving them into trash bags.
Overall, not bad, if I want to spend a day being convinced that I really do need aerodynamic toilet plungers that are a shade of green last seen in Las Vegas in 1957. I'm more of a grab-and-leave shopper, and not too fond of the maze layout they have going, so next time I go there I will insist on having more sleep beforehand. Saw a few things I liked, and some stuff that looked useful, but mostly I kept thinking: That would be so much better if I made it out of construction barricades, rebar, and an old door. Which is okay. I've been looking for an excuse to learn how to weld. I just gotta get some health insurance beforehand.
"Bleu," I kept saying, in the little This Apartment Is Twenty-Five Square Feet! showrooms, "I think I made this house in the Sims."
How To Test A Couch:
First, sit on arm. Rolled-arm couches are mandatory on Planet Indi, both for sitting on and for hooking a leg over. If that is comfortable, flop back so that both knees are hooked over arm while torso and head are on couch. Stay there a while. Kick feet around, maybe. Then get up and sit normally on the couch. Then slouch like you're half asleep and watching a movie. Then kick off shoes and lie flat, like you're napping. Wriggle around a bit. Lastly, pull back-pillow out sideways behind head and read something. If after all of this you are comfortable, it is A Good Couch. If people look at you funny during this, look at them funny right back.
... Bleu disappeared while I was doing this. I am not sure why. I reckon, if I'm going to seriously consider buying a couch, I must do all the things on it that I would do on it at home. Except without itching myself.
A lot of this was looking at office stuff, because if things go well sometime between now and the distant future we will actually need one, and need to furnish it. Bleu likes furniture shopping anyway, so it worked out well. Mostly well.
Bleu wanted to find a filing cabinet. At one point I found a thing which was similar, but contained a stack of shallow drawers instead. I told her I needed it for our office, and she asked me why.
"So I can keep stuff in it," I told her, because to me this was plainly obvious, being that I am Gadget Girl and all.
She: "But it's not a filing cabinet!"
Me: "I don't need it for files, I need it for stuff."
She: "Like what?"
Me: "You know, stuff. Cos I'm stuff-girl. Box cutters. Permanent markers. Wire cutters. Duct tape. Ethernet cable...."
She: "Oh, okay."
Me: "... spare staples, masking tape, galvy, solder would be good too, ooh, I'll need some screwdrivers..."
She: "... okay?"
Me: "... and I'll probably want a pack of spare knife blades and some playing cards and some pliers, needle-nose and regular, memory cards, oh and one of those putty knife scraper things, and zip-ties, and dog treats, thumb drives, and then I need to put all the computer parts somewhere..."
She: "OKAY WE'LL GET YOU ONE."
Me: "I might need two. Do they have bigger ones?"
What I really need is a sonic screwdriver and a field jacket with pockets that are bigger on the inside.
She: "Look, it's a thing you put on the wall the router goes in!"
Me: "If you get that and expect me to do anything with your routers you are putting it in a place where I don't have to stand on an ergonomic chair to see inside it."
She: "And I can put pictures on top!"
Me: "No higher than here, okay?"
She: "Or potted plants."
Me: "THIS HIGH."
She: "Whatever. Sculpture!"
Then we found these little stools that looked like death-cap mushrooms. They had spinny tops. We sat on them and spun a little, and then I decided we needed to figure out just how spinny they are. So I centered myself, gave one good kick-off, and we started counting. It went around nine and one-quarter times, although it started to slow noticeably at seven. I told Bleu to try it, but she said no. Because she is smarter than I am when it comes to things like reality and how to not get dizzy in the middle of Ikea.
Oh god and the PROPS. So, you know, there we are, traipsing through the store and looking at things. Bleu, being practical, is looking at the furniture. I, being me, am dorking out over how they have REAL BOOKS in the bookcases and dude they're in SWEDISH and I wish I knew how to read Swedish. And all the little props, because I love stuff like that -- the little fake laptops and cellphones and stereos and things they put in. I swear, whenever any of y'all have kids, as soon as they are old enough for such things I am getting them a giant crate full of stuff like fake fruit and decorative cellphones. And I'm all, dude dude dude that is so adorable the little buttons are labeled even though they don't do anything, and Bleu's all - you dumbass, I'm looking at the bookcase your fancy fake stereo is on. Which is what we're here for. The furniture.
We had lunch in the overpriced cafeteria, and the Troopers got to play a bit too. Which is always fun.
I wound up grabbing a decent amount of stuff, including a fancy bed for Riley, who until now has been a very deprived dog indeed because she's been forced to sleep on either the throw rugs or the people furniture, and has never had a bed of her own. She loves the bed, but she will not be having with the matching fleece throw blanket that goes on the bed. So it goes. Maybe it's too staticky for her feet. This bed is huge. It was fifteen bucks, which is incredible for a Riley-sized bed. Since I'm me, I of course had to figure out if I could fit -- I DID THIS ONCE I GOT IT HOME, THANK YOU -- and in fact I do fit on that bed, if I tuck my knees to my chest and curl into a ball. Riley thought that me being in her bed was a brilliant idea, and she punched me in the forehead to tell me how funny it was. Ow.
Anyway! By the time we got to ring our stuff up something like five days had passed (being that time in Ikea does not flow at the same rate as time in the rest of the world) and I was all tired and boggled and putting mental diareses over every vowel in every word I said.
So I got to the register and dumped out all my stuff and the cashier lady decided I needed one of those big blue plastic bags they sell you because they don't actually offer shopping bags. She was very insistent, and I was very dazed, so it was pretty much a lost cause, except that they were folded up tiny and that confused me.
She, waving around this tiny folded-up blue thing: "FIFTY-NINE CENTS. REUSABLE. YOU CAN BRING IT BACK NEXT TIME AND USE IT AGAIN. TO CARRY YOUR THINGS OUT. JUST KEEP IT IN THE TRUNK OF THE CAR. THIS IS BETTER THAN THROWING AWAY PLASTIC BAGS. FIFTY. NINE. CENTS. AND IT'S YOURS FOREVER. BETTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT."
Me, gesturing to the Dog Bed of Enormitude: "No, just, um. Will everything fit in there?"
She took the little blue square of plastic, flicked her wrist, and it went FWOOMP and turned into a gihugeous plastic bag that I could probably fit in -- although I have not tried that yet. It's almost as big as Riley's bed, so I probably would fit in it, if I folded myself up small. I'll probably use it to drag all my blankets down to the laundrette, instead of shoving them into trash bags.
Overall, not bad, if I want to spend a day being convinced that I really do need aerodynamic toilet plungers that are a shade of green last seen in Las Vegas in 1957. I'm more of a grab-and-leave shopper, and not too fond of the maze layout they have going, so next time I go there I will insist on having more sleep beforehand. Saw a few things I liked, and some stuff that looked useful, but mostly I kept thinking: That would be so much better if I made it out of construction barricades, rebar, and an old door. Which is okay. I've been looking for an excuse to learn how to weld. I just gotta get some health insurance beforehand.