Frantzylvania

My wife woke up one Sunday morning with a singular thought:  bunk beds.  Now, in reality this is something that she had been discussing for some time, and I had been largely ignoring for the same amount of time.  She’s pretty good at noticing when the kids have outgrown things, and is reasonably diligent about pointing it out, repeatedly, with the intent (I assume) that it make it past my defenses and land in my brain in the “take care of” area.  I am less good at noticing these sorts of things – feet hanging off the end of the bed, tight shorts that are indeed pants that are three sizes too small,  helmets split into two pieces hastily held together with duct tape, that sort of thing.  My mind was on power washing, not bunk beds, but she found a clever way through my pressurized focus – Cracker Barrel.

Cracker Barrel only stocks the finest wares

And so it was that we fatefully found ourselves headed to bastion of particle board and lingonberries that is Ikea, our guts swollen with a good ol’ country breakfast and a hankering for hex bolts and other hex-based accessories.

Our oldest was able to enter Smaland, a wondrous world of enchantment designed to imprison children while their parents get a rare break from the daily horrors of parenthood. And buy furniture. We took our youngest, placed her in the worlds strangest shopping cart, and set off in search of bunk beds upstairs in the gallery.

It surprisingly wasn’t a long process – they basically had three varieties, only one of which held my weight when I was doing body slams (WWF style) on the top bunk. We also picked out a small desk and rolling chair so that my children can learn what Daddy’s life is like. (Just sit here for many hours.  Occasionally get up and go into another room and sit there.  Periodically say things.  Repeat.)  As directed, we dutifully wrote down the name, aisle and bin number of our selections, and then headed down to Smaland to free Justine from the shackles of furniture store justice.

And that’s when it began.

After getting Justine, we entered the Marketplace, an overwhelming repository of every conceivable household item stamped with bewildering Swedish names. We quickly got lost, trying to understand the posted maps but they all seemed to just run in circles. I wasn’t concerned at first, but as time ticked on and we kept passing the wall hooks shaped like dog asses. I could see the worry in my wife’s face, even as she kept grabbing dustpans and picture hanging kits and absently throwing them into our cra-z-kart.

Then the lights went out, and it was clear the store was closing. Our screams (I tried English and Swedish) went unanswered, and so I stoically gathered my family and hunkered down for the night on a zebra print rug and draped in European curtains.  I was able to find an Anstandig (spiral notebook) and started keeping a journal to preserve the details of our ordeal for the inevitable Sundance winner.  Here are some key passages:

Day Two
It’s been over 24 hours since we became lost in the Marketplace. We’ve been pleading with the staff for help, but they continue to insist that the only way out is to find the Jansjos, then the Chosigts and then the exit will be right by the Vardefulls. And no they can’t walk us there nor even hint at what each of those things are, as that would be a violation of the IKEA Prime Directive, which is expressed in Swedish but involves customers, getting lost, emptying wallets and meatballs.

Day Three
We’ve built a crude shelter out of laundry hampers, toilet plungers and an unknown household item that’s either some kind of lamp or a avocado peeler – perhaps both. We beg shoppers that pass by for help but they are more interested in what the total cost of our makeshift hut is, and what other colors the hampers come in.

Taste best with just a dash of Swedish Fish

We’ve been subsisting on two bottles of Lingonberry jam and ‘meatball butter’ we stole out of someone’s cart and some weird Swedish coffee on deep discount near the bamboo plants.  The store is pretty warm, even at night, but to keep away the Swedish rats (they have big bushy mustaches) we’ve been burning wooden drying racks (or they might be record holders – I’m  really not sure).

Day 4
Today we discovered a set of lost families that have set up a rough feudal society over in carpets and bedding. Apparently they are at war with another set of families that controls access to the Fountain of Illestad, which after some questioning I discovered was a bathroom.  In any case, I was able to trade several ergonomic toilet plungers (which they sharpen and use for hunting) for the dark roast version of the coffee and an ancient scroll that details the location of the Chosigts.

We’ve gone through the last of our provisions – we’ll set out tomorrow at “lights on” for the Chosigts and hopefully make it out of this infernal nightmare.  My family is looking forward to getting home – there’s a good chance the animals all feasted on each other while we’ve been gone, and my wife is anxious to try out our new dustpan.

Day Five
With the help of the scroll, our family, dirty and haggard finally staggered out of the marketplace into the warehouse. Not wishing for our ordeal to be wasted, I turned to my wife and shakily told her that we would get our furniture.

“Oh shoot, I left the paper with the bin numbers back at the desk where we got Justine,” she said.

I dejectedly scratched at my patchy beard, and considered this.  I looked to the heavens, at my children, and then back to her, and then grasped her by the shoulders.

“We have to go back, Kim! We have to go back!”

And with that, I turned and led my family back into the abyss. Come hell or high water, my children will sleep horizontally oriented but vertically stacked as soon as humanly possible.

Parked car I accidentally steered us into
[not pictured]

Dear bicycle (and presumably unicycle) manufacturers,

I write to you today to enquire about a rather simple matter of which is presently rather pressing for me. Let me give a little background first.

My lovely soon to be 6 year old has finally made substantial process on effectively using your two-wheeled apparatuses. This has been an arduous process, with many bumps and bruises, skinned knees and many tears. It’s also been hard on my daughter. Nevertheless, within the past month or so we’ve freed ourselves from the shackles of training wheels, and she (roughly) can make her way perched atop her wheeled steed.

As enticement to achieve this goal, we recently purchased a new bike, one that more effectively worked for her unusually tall body, and appealed a bit more to her taste – which is to say more pink, and rainbowy. She loves it, and she’s willing to ride it – a rare double victory for us. Kudos to you folks for building such fine machines that so delight our children and thin our wallets.

During our slow march to this point, we’ve accumulated our fair share of children’s bikes – purple ones, tassled ones, and ones in which the pedals are fun shapes, like seashells or roadkill. I can describe these bikes in great detail, for as I write this to you I’m currently pinned beneath 5 of them in my garage, fending off mice with a rusty screwdriver and hoping my wife means it when she’s says she’ll come rescue after ‘just a few more rides’ at Sesame Place.

The hacksaw is just out of reach

Thus my question: why the hell don’t these bikes come with kickstands?

I mean seriously – I’ve been cleaning out the garage all day, perilously perching these pedal powered death machines against each other as they all lack the practical stabilization that a kickstand provides. And then a short stumble over lawn darts, a push away from an inadvertent noose of icicle lights, and I suddenly find myself at the bottom of this bicyclanche.

How can kickstands be considered an optional accessory here? It’s like selling me a plane without landing gear – she’s great in the air but when they stop you just need to roll them onto one wing? Or a boat without an anchor – when you’re done just push her up against the dock and hope for the best?  Or a bipod without a stabilizing leg (a “tri”-pod, if you will)?

So please, consider the humble plea of a man crushed, if not just in spirit but also by aluminum, rubber, and rainbow tassels. I shall endlessly ring this bicycle bell here in the hopes that you will heed my cries and include kickstands on your bikes, and/or dispatch the local emergency services to pry my lifeless body from this tangle of velocipedes.

With a gear shifter jammed in my armpit,
Mark

Here I sit in an Amazonian wonderland of pink and princesses, a world awash in hair ties, clips, scrunchies, headbands, bows and other hair related accessories I should not know nor care the names of. I constantly trip over piles of Polly Pockets, princess dresses and baby dolls, all of which are ‘my favorite and I can’t sleep without.’ I sadly understand the complex world of fairies, can recite entire stretches of Tangled dialogue, and can have serious and deep discussions about the metaphysical underpinnings of Strawberry Shortcake. And don’t get me started on Frozen.

This probably wouldn’t happen with more boys.

Yes, I’m a husband and the father of two little girls. I eke out an existence amongst them, subsisting on the unwanted raisins from their trail mix and the remnants of juice boxes they aren’t quite smart enough to figure out how to drain completely. And I live for those fleeting minutes at the fringe of day, when the kids finally pass out in their beds, books in hand, and the wife crashes on the couch mid-way through ‘Teen Mom.’ It is in this magic hour I gingerly pluck the Xbox controller from under a mountain of teacups and plastic scones, and reclaim my sanity by bi-secting Nazis with increasingly unrealistic weaponry.

I know what you’re thinking – having a wife and two girls is not unusual nor even excessive. This is seemingly true – my neighbor has three daughters, and probably has more on the way. And those poor scientists at Jurassic Park – hundreds of cranky female dinosaurs taking out millenia of repressed rage over pre-historic glass ceilings!

But I don’t think you understand the gravity of my situation. It’s not just the wife, or the little girls. No – I’m surrounded by females in this menagerie we call a house. Did I mention the two female dogs? What about the female cat? The female rabbit? And once I figure out how to check, I’m pretty sure our 3 hermit crabs are female as well. Hell, even our outlets are female.

Not pictured – rest of zoo.

No, I (and the plugs) stand alone in our house as the last bastion of maleness, trying to maintain the balance that nature demands through a standard regimen of burps, farts, and beer drinking. Stereotypical to be sure – but it makes me feel better and serves the practical purpose of clearing out the living room so I can watch The Walking Dead.

My aim here is to once again chronicle the absurdities of life, marriage and parenthood so that one day, ONE DAY, my kids will know what they put me through and why I’m sitting in that chair, staring blankly into space, arguing to no one in particular that Curious George was a just a delusion of the Man in the Yellow Hat – his Tyler Durden (ala Fight Club). But with less fighting and more ‘world-discovering.’

And just so that there’s no confusion – I love my family – my girls are adorable, and my wife is amazing. And the dogs – well the dogs currently think the cat poop is an ‘irresistible temptation.’ Gross.

Must be a girl thing.