We went to the Nottingham shopping place that grew up out of IKEA this morning. We didn’t actually go into IKEA, but both kids ended up being frog marched back to the car and the missus and I only started talking to each other about an hour after we got home. We were supposed to be going to Decathlon. But the missus started some mission creep by mentioning going into Next. My face betrayed me. The kids played up no end in Decathlon and it ended in tears. Icy silence prevailed on the drive home.

It seems the mere presence of IKEA is enough to start the red mist rolling in.

Shopping. What the internet was invented for.

molgrips – Member
Waste of *a life*? That’s taking snob heperbole to a whole new level!

IKEA = cheap to medium furniture that is nucer looking and better made than many similarly priced alternatives. It’s just a furniture shop, it’s not a threat to your lifestyle, no need to fight it via nasty mouthed stw posts

No idea why the hell you lot get so bloody worked up about it.

It’s because it’s soul destroying at best and migraine inducing at worst.. it’s like looking back in time to when furniture with canvas backs were all the rage, and chipboard was the In Thing.. like I said, 1996.

Still, you like it so there are folks willing to spend time/money in it.. 😆

I made the mistake of going to my local Wickes on a business park this morning to buy a lightbulb.
The horror, the horror…

Harry-the -spider

I came out with a 3ft blue shark, we called it Feargal. (Feargal Sharkey, The Undertones -1980s)

Ikea or Death

chipboard was the In Thing

I’m sorry, does everyone else make their cheap furniture out of solid wood nowadays? Got any links cos I would much rather have solid wood.

Actually, I’ve found there to be much more solid wood furniture at IKEA at the lower price points than other places.

But the missus started some mission creep by mentioning going into Next. My face betrayed me. The kids played up no end in Decathlon and it ended in tears. Icy silence prevailed on the drive home.

Winner of the best sentence containing Mission Creep competition 😀

This

is quite true.

I witnessed Louis Theroux, a man so chilled even Jimmy Saville and the Westboro Baptist Church were not able to wind him up, having a full blown argument with his partner about a chest of drawers in the cafe over some meat balls.

Be careful out there.

Oh and one more thing bikebouy, why do you want to be such a total ****? Seems a strange thing to be doing somehow.

I recall last time I went my eldest daughter being mortified with embarrassment as I tried on a colander as a hat.

I then made her come and stand with me for five minutes whilst we watched *every* adult bloke that went past them do the same 😀

ooooooOOOOOOOoooooohhh!!!

IKEA furniture is shite at the best of times, and so 1996.

Wrong on both counts. IKEA stuff is quite well made (at least up to the point it leaves the warehouse – once it’s in the hands of the ham fisted lazy public it’s a different story) and they do some really good mid century modern stuff. I have a bunch of Ligne Roset and a bunch of Ikea, and there’s no big difference in quality.

as I tried on a colander as a hat.

anyone who doesn’t pick up a colander and try it on at a jaunty angle isn’t human…Fact.

one more thing bikebouy, why do you want to be such a total ****?

Careful now. Down with this sort of thing.

I would have called it George

Would you love it and hug it and pat it and squeeze it and…

anyone who doesn’t pick up a colander and try it on at a jaunty angle isn’t human…Fact.

In my kitchen there is a tea cosy.

I haven’t yet but IT BUUUUUUUURNSSSSS!!!

I like ikea

I don’t really see the problem. It’s a shop that gets busy. So what?

Didn’t sound so bad then,did you leave the mother in law behind ?

IKEA flat pack design and implementation is certainly much better than the other flat pack stuff in our house.

_tom_ – Member
…Epicyclo why do you seem to be obsessed with pooing in the ikea bogs?

C’mon, who doesn’t don’t poo in the display bogs? 🙂

double post ,sorry.

Winner of the best sentence containing Mission Creep competition

The thing is, the missus never says “let’s go briefly to a shop you might be half-interested in, before going to a selection of oppressively hot, busy and vacuous shops so we can wander around like a tit in a trance for hours”. It’s always dressed up as “we need to go to x shop to buy y”. Time after time I think “ok, we’ll drive there, buy what we need, and go home”. I should know better.

Also, we have had our yearly Xmas shopping day whilst the kids are at school already. I’ve done my bit. This expedition is carefully planned to involve a nice lunch to break up the monotony of me having to pretend I’m interested.

I cannot help it. To me shopping is buying stuff you need in as short a time as possible. I don’t want a ‘retail experience’. I like Aldi. They don’t ask questions like “are you ok with your packing?” They throw your stuff at you, you lob it back in the trolley and sort it out at the side once you’re out of the way of other people. Perfect. Honestly, if I wasn’t “alright with my packing” do they expect I would keep quiet about it, leave the stuff to overflow onto the floor and only scream for help at the end?

Take your intrusive ‘customer care’ and save it for when you’ve screwed me over with some product that falls apart after one use and I have a genuine grievance. Strange how ‘customer care’ is not always so forthcoming when they’ve got your money isn’t it.

And I work in retail(!)

Personally I think going shopping with one’s wife is madness, I doubt I have done it more than five times in our 12.5 years of marriage. TBF I don’t really go into shops other than food shops and newsagents.

You lot do realise that the meat in the hotdogs/meatballs is just the ground up remains of other blokes who died trying to find the exit/were killed by their partners for suggesting it was time to leave too early?

It truly is the place of nightmares.

You lot do realise that the meat in the hotdogs/meatballs is just the ground up remains of other blokes who died trying to find the exit/were killed by their partners for suggesting it was time to leave too early?

It truly is the place of nightmares.

Yes, but it is Scandinavian and therefore it is desirable. They’re just so efficient and clinical. All of them. There are no exceptions. We should seek to ape them in all facets of life.

You lot do realise that the meat in the hotdogs/meatballs is just the ground up remains of other blokes who died trying to find the exit

Less sinister than I’d imagined then – I thought Småland was a big mincing machine.

Went first thing this morning had breakfast for three plus coffee just over 5 quid, went round during browsing time and was at the tills just after opening… I needed two plain lack tables at a fiver each which I couldn’t find anywhere for less , the kids high sleepers are definitely the best we saw for the price and are spot on for them. Some of the stuff they sell is a bit on the disposable side but it’s priced a accordingly. Never go when it’s busy and its fine…

dannyh – Member
…Time after time I think “ok, we’ll drive there, buy what we need, and go home”. I should know better…

Indeed. Unfortunately I did it first to my wife, in a spectacular fashion, before we were married, so for several decades I have been making up for it.

Late 60s, I needed a new part for my rigid Ariel motorbike. Part available 110 miles away in Aberdeen.
Say to girlfriend “Fancy a quick trip to Aberdeen?”

Turn up on the motorbike. GF was in mini dress, expecting a car. Came anyway, and sat on rear mudguard (no suspension) with only my folded up uni scarf under her. Two hours later got to the bike shop in Aberdeen, she was somewhat windblown (buttons at the back of her dress had popped off) and also possibly hypothermic (benefit of hindsight). Bought the part, and turned to go back.

“Aren’t we going to eat?” so I stopped at the edge of town and produced a bar of chocolate. (My budget didn’t run to eating out, it was all needed to feed the bike). Poor soul had thought that we would be hitting the shops in Aberdeen afterwards.

She was a bit grumpy by now, so I thought it best to press on.

Half way back to Inverness the bike died. I rang a mate to come with his bike and a tow rope. He turned up but without the towrope, so we nicked the top wire of the local police station fence. Near Nairn his tyre started to go down and it was dark, so he had to abandon us. We had to ring her ferocious father to come and rescue us. He towed me back home while she got to defrost in the car.

She also had 2 spectacular bruises at the tops of her thighs where my sprung saddle had been thumping on to them. With the fashion for mini skirts then, they were very visible which gave me a unearned reputation for vigorous amorous passion.

So if you see me going round IKEA saying “yes dear, no dear, I agree totally dear”, you’ll understand that it’s not a case of henpecked husband but an act of contrition which will never ever be completed.

Intresting sitting in a wet rain soaked car park watching poeple trying to load up a fiesta or a corsa with huge amounts of soggy cardboard boxes, then realising theres nowhere for the passengers to sit, followed by the rows about sizes, colours and the imortal phrases, WHY DID WE COME HERE TODAY, and IT WANT FIT IN THE BLOODY CAR..