Shopping therapy

IKEA isn't really my idea of fun but every now and again Maggie feels the urge to make changes to the house and we go. We nearly always argue when we're there. I am persuaded of the need for shelves or cupboards or whatever but I don't understand browsing the sofas and desks and wardrobes and breadboards and glasses and clocks and picture frames. I always surrender though and succumb to scissors or shower curtains as well as what I went to buy. Maggie usually goes for blankets and candles.

We went today. As we wandered the aisles we bumped into one of my English students out shopping with her husband. They'd travelled to Murcia from Cartagena to buy capsules for their Nespresso machine and popped into IKEA to compound the fun. Then it was one of Maggie's work colleagues and her husband. They'd driven the 50kms to buy a picture frame. 

We were there for bookshelves. We made an error. We took a car with 1.5 metres of carrying space to buy 2 metre shelves. IKEA compounded the fiasco by having a power problem which knocked out their tills. We abandoned our compensatory purchases of scissors, blankets, toilet brush, shower curtain and candle lantern near the unmoving till queue and left empty handed.

Modern times in Western Europe eh?