Bursting the boss' bubble

My wife works for a woman who is building a neo-industrial ultra-moderne revival home in the heart of downtown OKC.

Her new home will be surrounded by many old brick warehouses (some occupied, some not), parking lots, new concrete warehouse loft spaces, and plenty of overgrown empty lots.

The house is boxy, full of glass and steel, porthole windows, exposed beams, open floorplan -- you know the type. Think Pac Coast Highway rental units in southern Malibu. Plentiful out there, a rarity out here on the prairie.

She and her husband are spending a chunk of change on this place, and it will be a showcase abode upon completion.

Which is why my wife was stymied to find out that they're decorating their high dollar home with Danish particle board furniture.

Ikea rules their world too. Perhaps we've discovered the culprit in the missing Ikea catalog scandal of last October.

Seems she spent the holiday break down in Dallas, ordering up cabinetry, furniture, the works -- at the blue and yellow warehouse of furniture held together with white glue, wooden pegs, and allen head bolts.

S found it extremely difficult not to burst her bubble when her boss was enthusiastically (and with some braggadocio) telling her staff about their vacation excursion to the land of "for-ni-tuuura" and "ache-cha-pies" (This was one of Ikea's early radio ads in LA, with two fellas arguing about what Ikea specializes in...furniture, or accessories).

When S asked if the Ikea down in the big D was setup the same as all the others (accessories downstairs, furniture/restaurant upstairs), her boss surprisingly said, "oh, you've been to Ikea?"

What S wanted to say was "yeah, that's where students and people who can't afford real furniture shop in LA."

But what she actually said was "yeah, we liked to eat the swedish meatballs and follow the arrows painted on the floor."

Now, in defense of Ikea, we moved here with a half-dozen Billy bookcases, so we're still not completely free of our put-it-together-yourself-furniture lifestyle. Doubt we ever will be.

But then, we're not building a big budget neo-industrial ultra-moderne revival showcase home in the heart of downtown OKC.