IKEA, Oprah, and a Possible Mirage

Tonight is random night... just some recent incidents, thoughts, and such...

First, IKEA. Now, I like to go to IKEA occasionally. I like their candles and their kitchen gadgets, and I live in hope of finding a duvet cover in a pattern I like. I don't like it enough to go on the weekends. It's a zoo there most of the time, but weekends are impossible. Since I'm really just biding my time at work, using my office as a staging center for my job hunt, AND since IKEA is having sale, yesterday I decided to take off right after lunch and drive through the half-hour or so of suburban sprawl to get there.

I grabbed a cart and started filling it, but sparingly. Since I was alone, I had to make sure I could carry everything to the car by myself in one trip. Those of you who are IKEA veterans know that you cannot take carts to the parking lot. And there is no system to guard your cart if you have to leave it on the dock to bring your car around.

So anyway, I got some candles, some picture frames, some glass jars with airtight lids, some wooden hangers, a big tote bag to use at the farmers' market...I'm sure there were a few more items. After about an hour of shopping, I headed to checkout where the only real option was the self-serve kiosks. The lines for a cashier were ridiculous, and I had just shy of 15 (smallish) items, so self-serve it was for me. Except the scanner at my kiosk was for shit. I don't know if it's IKEA's self-checkout system in general, or if it was just the kiosk I got stuck with, but the scanner rang almost everything in twice. And you can't just delete the double ring yourself--you have to wait for an attendant to come and key in his or her code. Annoying, but simple, Right? Except that there were nowhere NEAR enough attendants working the self-serve lanes. Each time I double-rung something, it took longer for an attendant to acknowledge the blinking red light that summoned him or her to the problem kiosk. After the fourth double ring, I waited a full ten minutes for an attendant to show up, at which point I just gave up and left all the stuff at the kiosk, half checked out.

And then drove empty-handed back to work. At least a gallon or so of gas wasted... which really sucks nowadays.

Sheesh.

I wonder how long it will be before I venture back there again? Maybe never.

Now to Oprah.

I was "working from home" today, so I decided to do something I very seldom do: watch Oprah. Today was a summer version of her big "favorite things" show where she talks about great products and gives the audience piles and piles of merchandise. When the studio audience found out that this was a giveaway show, they went completely NUTS! The elation! The prayerful, upturned faces mouthing "Thank you, Jesus!" The middle-aged ladies jumping for joy as if they were high-school cheerleaders! The greed was palpable, just oozing out through the TV. It was raw and unfettered. It was so ugly. And all this for stuff I'll bet most of them never, ever use.

The big ticket item was a Weber grill. Audience members received it so that they could grill the to-die-for turkey burger Oprah wants them all to taste made from a recipe from Donald Trump's Palm Beach resort. Other stuff included (and this is not an exhaustive list), a tank top with spandex built in to smooth the torso, "Fit Flops" (a kind of Earth-Shoe-like flip flop), a wheelie weekender bag with a Garvin GPS system and a $200 hotel chain gift card tucked within, lots of make up, a cookbook, a self-help book, a CD of some lady singer...I'm sure there was more, but I don't recall it all.

My point is, how much of this stuff will those lucky ladies (and the handful of men) in the audience ever use? Maybe it's my situation (like, facing the possibility of having to tighten the belt in the fairly near future) that made me find this display of conspicuous consumption and raw greed to be, well, disgusting.

And finally...I walked up into Evanston this afternoon for a little stretch of the legs, and as I returned to Chicago along the lakefront curve, I noticed that I could see downtown, crystal clear. There was the John Hancock building. There was the Sears Tower. And the condo highrises all along the lakefront, marching row upon row all the way down to the Loop. It was beautiful! I wished I had my camera. But it was weird, because I've walked and jogged that stretch a hundred times before and NEVER seen downtown from there.

Later, when Jeff came home from work, we decided to walk up to Evanston again to eat at Cross Rhodes,a small Greek restaurant we like. I grabbed my camera, because I thought that the city would look GREAT in the waning light.

Alas, when we rounded the curve on our way home, the scene was as it always was: lake and more lake. No towering buildings glimmering in the distance.

And now I wonder... did I see a mirage?