Then yesterday my pal Dave came over & we spent the afternoon putting them together. Dave has a bit more Ikea experience than I do (& probably just more manual skill & competency in general) & it would have been pretty miserable if he hadn’t been there. As it worked out, though, in about two hours we had a fine new set of shelves.
One of the most valuable lessons that Dave imparted to me in the course of the afternoon was the importance of technical nomenclature in the Ikea assembly process.
For instance, Dave informed me, the second item from the left in the top row on this panel…
…is referred to as a “screwy-innie thingy,” while the third item from the left is properly referred to as a “dealiebopper.”
You won’t get any of this from the pages themselves; this knowledge is passed on only by oral tradition. Ikea instructions are wordless picture-dramas starring a character who Dave dubbed “Mr. Blobby”—all too aptly in this case, since he was an allegorical representation of me:
Note how Mr. Blobby is unhappy when he’s working on a hard floor, but happy when he’s working on a rug. Note also how if Mr. Blobby is perplexed, all he need do is call Ikea on the phone & his blissful smile of enlightenment is restored.
But note, most of all, how unhappy he is when he tries to do the job by himself, & how happy he is when a friend helps him. To the truth of this I can certainly attest.
In the midst of the afternoon, The Wife felt a tremor which she thought might be an earthquake, but since neither Dave nor I mentioned it, she assumed she was just feeling a vibration from the dryer, which was humming away in the laundry room next to where she was sitting. But later she turned on CNN & there was the news of a powerful quake in the northern Baja.
Baseball! The Diamondbacks kicked off their season this afternoon with a 6-3 win over San Diego. Hope that this proves a harbinger of the months to come! It was good to have baseball droning on my radio again.
The tremor your wife felt was no earthquake, but a spontaneous orgasm brought on by the proximity of two strapping men working their Ikea regimen together. Consider:
ReplyDeleteThe angst of pressed and tortured wood chips mixes with the crisp, clear tang of birch veneer, then rides the crest of male pheremones joined in a competitive clash of creative and constructive lust, scenting the air with what can only be called a true maleness. This flagrant exhibitionism, this hammer-head pounding, this twisting torsion, this manual manipulation, this piercing penetration, this…
What else could she do but succumb to her natural responses and, without warning, explode in some frenzied release. Embarrassed at this sudden yet delicious response to the call of your rugged masculinity, she, still flushed with confused desire, could only mouth weakly that she felt the earth move. And you and Dave, gentlemen to the core, and never wishing to take unfair advantage, wordlessly agree with a quickly thrown glance to interpret her submission literally, convincing yourselves that she did, indeed, feel an actual earthquake.
And as you went back to screwing boggledashes and gremlickshplices into the new billy bookcase, your wife closed her eyes tightly, hoping this pronounced triangle of sexual tension would dissolve with the licking of her lips and the tingling sweat at the back of her neck. Then, knowing your masculine exercise must continue without her further satisfaction, she squeezes her thighs together and draws her breath in deep, then relaxes with a sigh so deep and long that you and Dave hear and feel it through and above the squeal of an unlubricated screw.
Well, I didn't wish to be immodest about the about the combined power of my masculinity & of Dave's, but...let's just say I had my suspicions...
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