Cheap Swedish Furniture is Cheap for a Reason

I'm a big advocate of Ikea. Decent looking furniture that holds up throughout the years (in any apartment not located on a college campus) and at reasonable prices. In fact, when I moved up to this area last year, I basically furnished my entire apartment with Ikea products: sofa, kitchen table, chairs, end tables, lamps, and so on. I made so many trips to Ikea, that for the first time in my life, I didn't feel like I was going to get lost in the maze of a showroom they have there.

So I haven't been to Ikea much in the last year, mainly because I haven't been back in Philadelphia all that much, and because I didn't really need anything else from there. (Note: they do have an Ikea about 45 minutes away in New Haven, and there are a few in North Jersey, but let's be honest, who wants to intentionally go to North Jersey?) Then I moved into this new apartment. I'm privileged to have a larger living room, and one that is worthy of a coffee table. Additionally, I don't have that counter/ledge space I had in my old place where I'd put all sorts of junk (mail, papers, miscellaneous junk). Point of the story is that I went to Ikea this past weekend and bought myself a "nice" coffee table to complement my other Ikea furnishings. I bring it back up here with me on Sunday, and of course the box sits up against the wall for a few days until I decide to tackle the "put it together" process this evening.

What an absolute bitch. Those damn Swedes decided not to make some of the holes big enough for the screws, thus making it quite difficult to attach the legs to the top of the table. I was turning the screwdriver so hard that I got a blister on the palm of my hand. I wish I had a power screwdriver, because then I'd probably be in good shape and would have had the whole thing put together at this point.

Reason I tell you this story is because I'm tired and frustrated from putting together my supposedly "simple to put together" coffee table. It'll be Ross vs. Coffee Table, Round 2, tomorrow evening when I re-gain the strength to build this thing properly. Maybe I should have shelled out extra money for a coffee table that was already put together? Regardless, I will not back down from our Scandinavian lumber workers and I succeed by following a set of directions with pictures and no words. The little man in the pictures looks like those people from the Red Bull commercials, yet I can't figure out what his gestures mean in about 75% of the drawings.

I'm calling it a night. By the way, the TO news from Wednesday morning was very uneventful. He showed up, had a 5 minutes meeting with Andy Reid, and then went to practice. Still isn't talking to McNabb thought. That is one thing that must change, that's for sure.

Lastly, there's room on my site for a good Mike Tyson quote:

"I just talked to a gentleman named Jimmy, whose involved with club Jenna, you know Jenna Jameson. They said they were interested in getting me involved in that kind of business as well."-- Mike Tyson when asked about his career options after boxing.