I shot a text to Jed. He was quick to reply.
It was the perfect spring day: the sun was shining, the swarms of black flies were still in egg form preparing to hatch and consume us all. The air stirred with the slightest fart of a breeze. It was the perfect day for a bike ride.
Which is exactly the reason that Jed and I ended up going shopping at Ikea.
We were dropped off with two bikes, bike locks, a joint and instructions to call for help should we find what we needed.
I can’t believe that I’m doing this.
Jed had never been to Ikea before. Though he had been in the area pleanty.
The trails used to go all through here. Are we really doing this?
I laughed and lit a spicy little guppy. Have a puff. It’ll be fun.
We wandered through the gaping maw of an entrance. Our expressions mirrored the door. Woooooooooooooowwwwww we drawled, look at all this stuff…
We wandered through the hamster trails following arros created by lights glowing on the floor.
Jed was stunned. It’s all a big giant maze. And it’s all fake. We’re moving through a maze of deception!
I giggled, That’s life bud. None of this matters. None of it really lasts. Fashion.
Jed shook his head. Fashion. Bullshit. How quickly can you wash yer arse with the glories of nature?
Then?
Jed smirked, then kill it and eat it and chuck the rest in a landfill.
Chuck the landfill in the landfill.
Me: My kid's soccer team wants to play hide and seek here.
Him: They should play capture the flag instead.
Me: They could use bingo dabbers instead of paintball guns.
Him: Fifteen year old boys? They’d be kicked out in minutes.
Me: How long would a bunch of us last?
We both laughed agreeing that we’d likely be worse. Or at least they’d cut the kids a bit of slack - spending time looking for their adults before deciding that they were up to no good.
With them, it may be chalked up to youth.
Me: How could a couple of old shits like us get away with it?
Him: Don’t know that we could.
The munchies screamed most loudly just as we made our way through the kids section with the unfortunate name
and oh my is ideka ever the land of the unfortunate names.
I have confirmed adhd and I suspect dyslexia.
Well, I do believe that this may be IKDKA related lysdexia. I pick up the tags to look at the items and I just freeze. Nothing works. I shut down. The names? they look like a two year old with a box of blocks just stared smashing letters together then some beautiful Sweedish person with refinement, grace and a love of poop jokes would smile and praise his son… Ya Calle. Sis is goud. We are so proud. Very proud. Top proud.
I can’t handle it though. I can’t say the Ikea toddler words. Instead, I just see a couple of letters - one in the beginning, the next near the end then gruntmumble the rest.
Right?
It’s terrible showing off Ikea stuff to friends.
friend: What’s that called?
Me: Oh this? It’s from KAIDALIA it’s called a Symfoknoskoloubutnmlm
We finally found our way out of my digression and lined up for meatballs. Meatballs. Both of us.
Then?
Both of us meatballs saw a woman we knew and hung around with in high school. She was working there washing trays and cleaning up. I know she had professional work before this gig. That might not have worked out. Now she was doing dishes and cleaning up. She did not seem happy.
When she saw us she turned red and rushed away. We were both annoyed. We wanted to chat. Neither of us wanted to judge. She took care of that for us by judging herself. It’s a shame. I wanted to ask about how her mom was. Perhaps that wasn’t the best time.
We finished our meatballs and sauntered off to deal with the basement dungeon of consumption. As we made our way towards the exits, we discovered that none of the items we wanted were in stock.
The items that they did have?
Well, they were too high to be sold to us. 1
We were too high to buy them.
So we left.
but not without indulging in the greatest part of the Ikea experience: The shopping carts.
Ikea shopping carts are built in a similar way to those baggage carts at the airports.
Though they have a similar build, Ikea carts are much more capable. The wheels roll beautifully. And all four rotate a full three hundred and sixty degrees. They are pure agents of chaos.
Run. Jump. Roll. Repeat.
Yeah, people looked for a while. A security guard was about to come and speak with us. He looked young and a bit bashful. He seemed pre occupied both his phone and his radio.
Having seen this movie before, we ditched the cart and unlocked our bikes. As we made our way to depart, the guard had received his orders. We were to come with him and sign some papers.
A familiar scent filled the air. My spine tingled. Conflict. Delicious conflict. The kind of conflict of my youth: Me having fun and someone making it even better by telling me it was wrong and bad.
Kiss m’arse I cried as we sprinted away, our fingers raised in the only suitable salute.
Jayzus Jimmie, I didn’t realize that KIEDIA could be so much fun.
I grinned and thought to myself, we’re a couple of old farts who’ve run outta fucks, what could possibly go wrong? Then I turned to Jed and said:
Next time, we bring bingo dabbers.
Where can you go add some chaos?
How can you bring juvenile joy to your day?
In the self serve area they can’t take down stuff from above as the lift situation is not something they can do with humans around.