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Ian Beckett Nov 2012
1 simple set of instructions
4 heavy flatpack boxes
5 square aluminium legs
27 painted pieces of wood
100 ridged wooden dowels
101 white plastic ***** covers
102 blister-causing screws of various sizes.


Assumption that no unter or ober
Equals drunken waves of shelves
Sadly means finished is unfinished
Reworked masterpiece complete at last
Male ego boosted by admiring plaudits
Value enhanced by effort expended
Flatpack frustration in 4 easy pieces.
Donall Dempsey Jan 2016
THE LOVING BATTLE

He said: "Loving her was like...
putting together an Ikea flatpack
with a  few screws missing!"

She said: "Ha...loving him was like...
putting together an Ikea flatpack
in the dark...without knowing what it was!"

We called them" "The Ikea Couple"
knowing it could never last.
"It will end in tears!" we said.

Man & wife now
these...what
last 40 years?

"How come...you've come this far!"
we enquired incredulously
"We love to row!" they say simultaneously

"We call it THE LOVING BATTLE!"
He calls her: "Hammer!"
She calls him: "Tongs!"

"When it looks all wrong
we know it's alright!
We both enjoy a good fight!"

"And....
...the making up?
That's the best bit!"
Donall Dempsey Feb 2019
THE LOVING BATTLE

He said: "Loving her was like...
putting together an Ikea flatpack
with a  few screws missing!"

She said: "Ha...loving him was like...
putting together an Ikea flatpack
in the dark...without knowing what it was!"

We called them" "The Ikea Couple"
knowing it could never last.
"It will end in tears!" we said.

Man & wife now
these...what
last 30 years?

"How come...you've come this far!"
we enquired incredulously
"We love to row!" they say simultaneously

"We call it THE LOVING BATTLE!"
He calls her: "Hammer!"
She calls him: "Tongs!"

"When it looks all wrong
we know it's alright!
We both enjoy a good fight!"

"And....
...the making up?
That's the best bit!"
Sam Steele Apr 2021
My wife said ‘I’d like a new kitchen’
And I had a Saturday free
With ambition designs for the project
We both had a wild spending spree

We picked up a range made of flat pack
And then went to the café to eat
The choice of hot food was extensive
And we both had a Swedish meat treat

My mancave was short of some gadgets
So, I thought I would pick up a few
You know, gizmos I’d need for the project
You can find in a big B & Q

Like chrome plated long nose snipe pliers
With a bright coloured high friction grip
A high-powered well-balanced hand drill
With a full set of carbonised bits

To help with the cutting and drilling
I bought me a fancy work bench
I got several adjustable spanners
And an American style monkey-wrench

With devices galore in my kitchen
A heart full of hope and a song
The flat pack was open and waiting
And a belief that nowt can go wrong

The kitchen was stripped of its cupboards
(Destruction sound so much like me)
The skip filled with trash and detritus
The air filled with cursed deities

The cupboards assembled, but wobbled
With left over dowels and screws
They collapsed right back into flat pack
And the air turns a little more blue

It can’t have been too many gadgets
So clearly, I needed some more
And after a hot steamy cuppa
I bought most of the rest of the store

I picked up a taper pin punch set
The label said “high tension steel”
I don’t know if that makes a difference
I just thought that it had a nice feel

Who needs a wall grooving chisel?
I don’t know but had one to hand
A magnesium carbon disc grinder
In case I was tempted to sand

I tried ultra-thin premium somethings
A large milling thingamajig
A jig made for holding a widget
And widgets from small up to big

By midnight the flatpack was kindling
There was no Sunday roast the next day
There were no scrambled eggs Monday breakfast
For a week we just ate takeaways

Come Friday raw bacon and sausage
Were beginning to look appetising
The wife gave me fairly blunt warnings
That showed her blood pressure was rising

It was time for a nail gun and ladder
And extension bars for my all sockets
It was taking so long I bought knee pads
And a tool belt with 15 large pockets

The riveting gun seemed quite boring
But I just loved the boring device
I had not a clue how to use them
But simply to own them was nice

Counter sinks for sinking the counter
A compressor for compressing some air
I also bought 3 different augers.  No reason
But because they were there

With the credit card pushed to its limits
And a month filled with heartache and trouble
I was craving hot food or a cuppa
From a kitchen all gadgets and rubble

But every contraption just vexed me
I was starving and then lost my cool
I condemned all of the useless devices
My wife just blamed one useless tool

We had not had a hot meal in ages
Since the meatballs we bought at IKEA
I guess gadgets are pretty much useless
If the one using them has got no idea
Yenson Jun 2021
The whole thing is a con trick. But what is interesting is why so few adults exist in our societies willing to stand up to it.


THERE is an ugly intolerance in the air. It is sometimes called “cancel culture”, but that doesn’t quite catch the whole horrible trend.

This trend insists that everyone has to think the same thing. We all have to say the same thing. And this trend has zero tolerance for, let alone delight in, the fact that people think differently from each other.

Instead it insists we all conform to one narrow view of everything. It is a wretched, life-limiting vision. And it must be opposed. By people from every side of the political aisle, and none.

A classic example of the trend emerged this week with the launch of GB News. This new news and current affairs channel includes a host of famous broadcasting names, including former BBC grand inquisitor Andrew Neil.

It has said that it is going to challenge the BBC status quo and give more diversity to UK broadcasting. But it had not broadcast even a minute of programming before the cancel mob came for it.

Activist groups decided to portray the channel as “divisive”. Because some of those on the platform have said that they would like to end “cancel culture”, these groups pretended that the channel was somehow extreme.

The channel has said it won’t follow the boring, left-wing group-think of so much media. So the activists pretended it was “far-right”. Nothing could be further from the truth.

But “truth” is not something  the woke activists care about. As a result, they decided to make the most outrageous claims possible about the channel. And they then decided to pick off the advertisers one at a time. Hoping in the process to destroy the channel’s business model.

It is the same technique that has been tried in recent years on a number of newspapers and other media in this country. Target the revenue and you can hope to close them down completely, or at least change the editorial decisions.

Before you know it, we don’t have a free Press, but a Press dictated by mobs. Mobs carefully directed by sinister and unaccountable groups with a deeply political agenda of their own.

Such people have already chalked up some successes against GB News. Within hours of the channel starting to broadcast, the cancel mob were taking notes. They then started the  campaign against every company that had advertised on the new channel.

Outrageous claims
The Swedish furniture company Ikea was among the first to agree to withdraw its advertising on the channel. The retailer said  the new channel is not in sync with its “humanistic values”.

Who knew, as they were struggling to assemble an Ikea flatpack, that the whole thing was based on “humanistic values”? I’ve felt a lot of things when struggling with their wretched furniture. But “humanism” has never been one of them.

At least Ikea has quickly seen sense. Yesterday it reversed its ad ban, saying it was “too soon to make an informed decision” and adding “it was not our intention to polarise our customers or others. A decision on our future approach will be taken in due course.”

One of the other advertisers to buckle under this stupid pressure is a cider company called Kopparberg. Person- ally I’ve never been able to stomach cider of any kind, so Kopparberg wasn’t on my radar. It  certainly is now, after the company claimed that its adverts had run on GB News “without our knowledge”.

A post on the company’s social media account  said: “Kopparberg is a drink for everyone and we have immediately suspended our ads from this channel pending further review of its content.”

What is this *******? “Kopparberg is a drink for everyone”. Really? Is it a drink for children? Probably. Is it a drink for grown-ups who like a decent pint? Clearly not. But is it a drink exclusively for people who think exactly like whichever woke idiot  put out that statement? Definitely. So not “everyone” then.

Just look at that level of sanctimony. It’s a ***** company, for goodness sake. Yet here it is preaching away about “further reviews” and much more. Who does it think it is?

The truth is that the whole thing is a classic woke mob attack. The mode of operating is now clear. It makes a set of outrageous claims against a political target. It then megaphones those claims and asks anyone at all connected with the target how on earth they can live with themselves.

So people are tarred by association with an imaginary enemy. Normal, mainstream opinion gets repackaged as “far-right” or some similar nonsense  then companies and others are asked how they can bear to be associated with such toxic views.

The whole thing is a con trick. But what is interesting is why so few adults exist in our societies willing to stand up to it

DOUGLAS MURRAY

— The End —