The lords of reasonably priced pine furniture and homewares, Ikea, has opened a branch in Funabashi in Chiba. This is about an hour from Tokyo, so on a whim, Kei suggested that we hire a car this morning and hit Ikea, deliver a TV we were giving away and drop some stuff round to a friends. Anyway the day went pretty much as predicted. All couples should visit either a garden centre, homewares centre or Ikea on weekends. It is law. It should be a miserable experience. It is law.
Kei got up at an unearthly hour to watch Argentina Vs Mexico. He then stayed up until after 10. I woke up naturally then - he hadn't woken me.
Kei rang around a few places to get the best deal and then he finally went to the nearest place and got a nippy little small car - liked it. Toyota. Then we finally left about 12. About 2 hours later than I would have liked. I said 'If we hire a car again i'd really like to leave sooner - then we can get more out of the day' he said 'It's your fault - you were asleep' I said 'What time did you get up' He said 'six' I said 'Why didn't you wake me up?' he said 'You were asleep' I said 'If you had woken me up I would have got up and we could have got out earlier - you can wake me up any time, give me a time to be ready and I'll be ready' he said 'It's your fault you were asleep'. Now Some might say this is a cultural difference not to be judged - a different view of logic. I say he was being a tosser. Oh yeah and go and get a CND badge. The funny thing is that in the 4 hours he had been awake, he had managed to be online, not chosen a car, not booked a car and not taken a shower and not done anything really. That all came after my appalling behaviour of not waking up earlier.
Aaaaaanyway, we got away in the end and the day followed what I can confirm as pretty much the standard great day out.
Get to end of road - wife forgets something, husband is supposed to have put the thing is wife's bag, wife goes back to get it, husband put it behind the bag, husband maintains wife took important thing out of bag, wife says, no it wasn't in there, husband says yes it was and then calls wife stupid. Wife says yes dear, never mind let's get going.
Within about 3 minutes of hitting the road, husband is huffing and puffing and muttering things in Japanese, the rough equivalents being 'idiot' 'what are you doing' 'you can't drive' 'Did you see that idiot?'. The reasons can range from anything to changing lane or stopping at a red light. I never saw any actually dangerous driving today. And red lights - a whole story in itself. Now I think maybe my husband thought that driving through central Tokyo to the Globe's busiest Ikea was going to be one long, straight, traffic free zone given the surprise and consternation he experienced at every queue, traffic signal, junction, zebra crossing infact anything that didn't mean he could cruise from A to B at 60 mph. I try saying you know, just accept that it's going to involve some waiting and stopping, the journey.
So we get to the traffic near to Ikea and fair dos, it takes a good half hour to go through about 3 sets of traffic lights, but WE ARE GOING TO THE ONLY IKEA IN JAPAN - ON A SUNDAY AFTERNOON AND THE SUN ISN'T OUT AND RAIN IS FORECAST MANY OF THE 35MILLION PEOPLE OF THIS SPRAWLING METROPOLIS WILL BE CANCELLING THEIR PLANS TO GO SURFING TO GO TO IKEA. Can I just confirm at this point that it was the man's suggestion to go to Ikea. I was well up for it - but it wasn't gnarly wife insisting on hitting furniture store. Gnarly wife makes an appearance later. Soon infact.
So by the time we are within one hundred metres of the Car Park for Ikea - THE ONE car park for Ikea might I add, the husband is fed up of waiting and decides to join right hand lane and drives past all the stupid queueing drivers, then realises that's the queue for the car park but it is too late and too rude to jump in and drives straight past the entrance saying 'looks full anyway' Good one. Wife 'So where are we going now - to the secret car park that noone else knows about that will speed us directly to the front of the queue and directly to the best parking spot in the place.' I mean... Ok so he is not impressed by the biting sarcasm - bite me. I hate sarcasm too frankly, when delivered poorly and without intelligence, but really - this was a minor stroke of genius 'Shut up Bitch' He was mad mad mad. We then had to drive for another 5 mins away from Ikea, then turn back and join another equally long queue (in the other direction) for the one car park. I honestly don't get the whole silly dance. Anyway I think I tried to justify my outburst, but could see by his gait and look on his face that I should just shut up so I did, I sighed a few time to show my frustration and he swore at me. A lot. Vicious. Now here is where things do differ from my memories of many marital travel rows. I shut up. We finally got in with a very short wait - straight into a parking space and tried to make friends and only after I had allowed him to practice double drop kicks on my arse (that is kicking the butt twice with a flick of the ankle in one jump) and then double right plus single left (it does actually hurt by the way) did he warm to me and start talking again. But it was a stressful journey.
Now many would get into some deep theoretical psychological discussion about how men these days feel demasculized and need to reclaim their power in certain ways. I say there's no excuse for being a freaky C##T.
It's after midnight and the England Ecuador match just started. COME ON!!! Hope I can stay awake - 6 o clock start tomorrow. Maybe I should just watch 1st half...
