The Tuesday Weekend Report: Surviving the Swedish Labyrinth and 400kg of Regret

Yes, I know what day it is. It’s Tuesday. Presenting a "Weekend Update" on a Tuesday might seem like a glitch in the matrix, but honestly, these are strange times we live in. Besides, my body is still heavily recovering from the past 48 hours, so in my mind, the weekend hasn't quite finished processing yet.

If you think weekends are for resting, recharging, and perhaps enjoying a leisurely brunch, you clearly don't own a home, have children, or possess a spouse with "vision." My weekend was less of a retreat and more of a tactical endurance mission.

The Calm Before the Storm (Friday)

The weekend actually started deceptively well on Friday evening. We celebrated my father-in-law's birthday with a dinner. It’s always genuinely nice to see the whole family unit assembled. We went to a classic brasserie—good, hearty food and lots of chatting.

Afterward, my wife, in an act of benevolent chauffeuring, dropped me off at the local snooker hall to shoot some pool with a buddy. Said buddy was kind enough to agree to drive me home later. This was the perfect setup: I had a designated driver (a "BOB," as we call them here in Belgium). The stars had aligned for a night of guilt-free beer consumption.

Tragically, due to the excessive amount of brasserie food I had just inhaled, I couldn't manage more than a couple. A wasted opportunity of epic proportions.

Saturday: The Weight of the World (Literally)

Saturday arrived far too early. Waiting for me was a chore I had been actively dreading. The previous weekend, we had purchased an entirely new bedroom setup for our eldest son. This meant the garage was currently hosting a chaotic mix of the dismantled old bedroom and the pristine boxes of the new one.

The mission: Get the old stuff to the recycling park. The complication: The recycling park in our own town is currently closed for a major update—for an entire year. This meant venturing into unknown territory: the neighboring town’s dump. I’d never been there. It felt like an away game without a GPS strategy.

After essential coffee intake, I hooked the trailer to the car. I quickly dismantled one last TV cabinet (which could go down the stairs but refused to fit on the trailer whole), and began loading. I ended up securing about 200kg of miscellaneous wood, particleboard, and memories onto the trailer.

Then came the half-hour drive to the new recycling park, only to immediately reverse the process: unloading 200kg of awkward, heavy furniture parts and throwing them into giant containers.

Let me be clear: for a soft-handed desk worker like myself, this is hard labor. The Belgian weather gods decided to help by making it rain just enough so that every piece of wood was slippery, wet, and utterly miserable to grip. My spine was already sending letters of complaint to management.

After a quick refueling (food), it was time to drive the eldest son to his sports match. That was only an hour's drive—yay. We got back home around 7:30 PM, victorious with 3 points in the bag. He played a solid game, though there’s always room for improvement.

By the time we got back, my wife had finished painting the bedroom. So, after dinner, with what I can only describe as "fresh reluctance," I started assembling the new bed.

The first wave of stress hit immediately: My wife noticed the old slat bases weren't the same brand as the new bed frame. Would they fit? The tension was palpable. After an hour of assembly, we encountered the real crisis: We had grabbed a wrong box at the store.

The side panels of the white bed were... grey.

Now, personally? I thought it looked kind of cool. A two-tone, modern aesthetic. A happy accident. My wife did not share this artistic vision. Something about it not being "Zen," or disrupting the "Yin and Yang" of the room. The verdict was swift: It had to go back.

Sunday: Into the Wild West (IKEA)

Sunday morning required another early rise. Whoever perpetuated the myth that weekends are for catching up on sleep was a dirty liar. We had to go back to IKEA to exchange the grey parts.

We arrived at 10:30 AM. The store opens at 10:00 AM. The parking lot already looked like it does at 3:00 PM on a rainy Saturday before Christmas. It was terrifying.

We went to the customer service desk and pulled a ticket. The estimated waiting time stared back at us mockingly: 45 minutes. We asked if we could just leave the heavy box there while we waited and went for a coffee.

I realized then why it was so busy so early. It's the breakfast. The famous IKEA €1.20 to €2.00 breakfast. It lures them in like sirens calling sailors to the rocks.

When we returned to the service desk after coffee, our number had just passed on the screen. We weren't even gone 30 minutes! In a moment of desperation, we pulled a slightly unethical move and sneezed ahead of a few people. This earned us several very angry glares. I’m not proud of it, but IKEA feels a bit like the Wild West. You do what you have to do to survive.

Walking through the store itself was worse. I am convinced some people have made a hobby out of walking as slowly as humanly possible, perfectly in the center of the aisle, ensuring no one can pass. Then there are the ones who just stop dead in the middle of a walkway to contemplate a spatula. My patience meter was in the negatives.

To cap off the IKEA experience, the overwhelming assault of fifty different perfumes in the scent section made me sneeze loudly. Immediately, I heard a woman behind me mutter to her partner that it was "incomprehensible that sick people still come outside these days." Lady, it’s allergies and sawdust, calm down.

The Final Stretch

We got home around 1:00 PM, ate, and watched the Genk football match. We will speak no further of this match. It didn't happen.

Around 4:00 PM, I resumed the montage marathon. By 11:00 PM, the worst was behind us. The main structures were standing.

When I say "the worst," I am lying. The true test of a marriage and sanity is the "finishing." I still need to find the courage and time to align the cabinet doors and drawers so they hang straight and in sync. Anyone who has assembled IKEA wardrobes knows this special kind of hell.

Oh, and I still need to order two extra-long UTP cables. And apparently, installing an LED strip is now a mandatory requirement for a teenager's room. That’s on the list too.

So here we are on Tuesday. I have DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness) that feels terminal. The second day is always the worst. Every muscle I didn't know I had is screaming at me whenever I stand up.

But, the son is happy with his new room. Now he just has the monumental task of going through all the boxes of his old stuff to decide what goes back in. I wish him luck. I’ll be on the couch, applying ice packs and trying not to move until Friday.

Cheers,
Peter