An Open Letter to Ikea

Dear Ikea,

Where the fuck is our fourth allen screw?

Come on, don't pretend you don't know what I'm talkinga about. The fat-assed potato people on the instruction card claim that there are supposed to be 4x. But, in the cold, harsh realities of life as I know it, there are only 3x.

Where is our other x?

How could you betray me, after I singlehandedly convinced my wife that we needed to replace the aging black office chair in our house for your new, attractive mesh-back Karsten? I mean, the foam was wearing thin, and the cushion has suffered the indignities of staining from my mastubatory activities, but, did we really need a brand new office chair? No. But I made my poor, sweet wife believe we did, and I convinced her that we needed the Karsten.

And this is how you treat me? By giving us a packet of two arm-rests that are supposed to be affixed to said chair with 4 allen screws, and only three allen screws followed us home? That, gentle store of blue and yellow, is, in a word, fucking gay.

You lure us into your store time and time again. Mrs. Apron and I get totally schmoopie when we are ensconsed within your flakeboard and your veneer. I have no idea why-- we know 93% of your merchandise is constructed with wood glue and Kleenex, but there is something magical and endearing about you. Maybe it's all the pregnant women milling about.

Seriously, what's up with that?

My wife and I play "Count the Bellies" every time we go to visit you. One time, I got 6 bulging baby-filled bellies in one visit. 6! I think that's the largest compendium of pregnant women permitted by federal law in one space that isn't a lamaze class or Harpo Studios. I don't understand why pregnant women are drawn to you. It isn't like your cribs and shit are all that.

I'm sure they're all missing fucking allen screws, too.

I really don't want to make you the target of my snarkety bloggy snark. Really, I don't. But, remember when we purchased not one, but two Hemnes dressers in March and you sold us one with an already-mounted upside-down drawer track? You think that's funny, you Swedish motherfucker? Do you think Volvo would get away with selling its pleated trouser-wearing, Episcopalian customers S-40s with upside-down cup-holders?

No.

The Norse gods are angry with you, my friend.

Now I am typing this blog entry in a chair with no arms. My biceps are feeling fatigued because my elbows have nothing to rest on, even after I paid $79.00 for the chair and $20.00 for the armrests that now sit on the floor of our office, because we are missing an allen screw. Sure, we could have put one of the armrests on, but that'd be stupid. Our chair would look like a circus freak.

Why do you do this to people? To people who come back to you time and time again? You are like an abusive boyfriend, parading around your Winnebago with no shirt, pornographic pec tattoos holding a half-consumed bottle of Old English Malt at 11:30am.

Stop beating on me, Mick. I love you.

And I want my fucking allen screw, you abusive bastard.