Goddamn Swedish Furniture Designers!
Brought to you in part by Ikea.

As I alluded to earlier, I spent a fair amount of my weekend putting together furniture for my friend J. Some of it was really easy, most of it was confusing as hell. The biggest problem is that Ikea instructions do not contain any words, which is understandable because of the international aspect of their business, but seeing as the items were purchased in Chicago(Schaumburg, actually), and had undoubtedly been here for some time, why the hell can't they put the directions in English? (Keep in mind that while I acknowledge that the USA does not have an official language, let's face it, English is expected- but that's not my fault.) It's just too confusing the way they have it, and it makes it very hard to determine whether or not you have the appropriate piece. I am specifically referring to the entertainment center I built, which had two pieces that were almost identical, and the measurements were not converted terribly accurately, so I had to guestimate(fortunately correctly) as to which piece I had. Frustration ensued. Some kind of international labeling system should be devised and adopted.

The desk on Sunday was even more of a fiasco, as the directions made it damn near impossible to complete the project as they were set up. It's really hard to screw legs onto the support system underneath the table after you've already attached the support system to the bottom of the table. I got around it, of course, by adding the legs before attaching the support.

Enough on that. I had that rant brewing for long enough, and my back is still sore from lifting such a heavy piece of furniture.