New friends, flat packs and fisting

I hate Ikea.

I don't object to their furniture. I don't object to their meatballs. I don't object to their stupid names for things.

I just detest the whole experience.

Traipsing out to an industrial wasteland on the edge of town.

Feeling depressed by the people running out of the store clutching 2 euro vases that they think hold the secret to happiness.

Trying to find an 'assistant' to 'assist'.

The fact that you can't get in and out in fifteen minutes.

So, it was with a heavy heart that I accepted le FP's request to go to Ikea last night. We've needed new wardrobes for, like, ever and last night a friend was offering to take us out there in his car. We couldn't really say no.

The friend is a guy who le FP knows vaguely and I know even less well. I have a feeling he's after a threesome. He keeps on doing us both favours and turning up at the house with gifts for us. Anyway, I digress.

We don't know him that well, but last time I saw him, he was in a bar wearing 'military' gear (i.e. a camouflage jacket, a khaki string vest and green make up on his cheeks) and heading off to a 'specialist' evening in a salle de fêtes in the suburbs.

He spent the entire journey recounting his evening at the 'Soirée Cuir, Latex, Uniforme'. Now, these kind of salles de fêtes cater to marriages, funerals and barmitzvahs - you know the kind of establishment.

What they'll have thought of this fetish evening, God only knows.

Apparently, there was pubic shaving, various swings and glory holes and - la pièce de résistance - a 'fisting podium'. But again, I digress.

We arrive at Ikea and I'm hungry. Three 50 cent hot dogs (that's how much they cost, they're not designed by the rapper) later and I'm still starving, but more willing to take on the behemoth of a store.

Actually it turns out that this Ikea is no behemoth. In fact, it's positively rikiki, the smallest Ikea on earth, quite possibly.

Nonetheless, we still manage to lose three hours within those hellish yellow and blue walls.

The friend has turned up wearing some god awful outfit that includes a badge that reads 'be happy'. I'm not sure if this is a reminder to himself or what, but he's just lost his job so I can only think it's some kind of motivational device. Anyway, he's so badly dressed that le FP and I are very happy when we manage to give him the slip somewhere behind the Billy bookcases.

He finds us again as we are busy choosing our wardrobes. He listens to us rant and wail about how the house is full of shit and how we have to stop buying things. He hears our tales of woe as we recount to the poor assistant how we have no storage space in our apartment.

He then disappears. Again.

Next time we see him we're at the checkout. He's paid and is waiting for us to be reborn into the real world - the world where tables don't have names.

He has a trolley full of shit.

When we get to the car, he presents us with a gift each.

He gives us each a 2 metre long cuddly shark. One each. I kid you not.

"Thank you" says le FP, graciously.

"Where the fuck do you expect me to put these" say I, somewhat less graciously, but worn down by the whole experience.

"I thought we could use them in the bedroom" said the friend, with a menacing look on his face.

We journeyed home in uncomfortable silence. He dropped us at the front door and we took our shopping from the boot (the wardrobes being delivered at a later date), thanked him and sent him on his way.

As we waved him off, le FP turned to me.

"Don't those sharks look lovely in his back window" he said.

He's méchant, that boy.

I guess that's why I like him....

The opposite of cool

Le FP got given a handful of Nintendo DSi's a while ago (don't ask).

Naturally, one found it's way into my workbag and was soon loaded up with les Lapins Crétins. If any of you have a big commute, I can truthfully say that slingshotting virtual rabbits into the air at virtual targets is a fine way to pass the time.

So it was a bit of a worry when I realised late one night that my workbag had suddenly gone missing. I'd had it that evening when I left for dinner with my boss. But then I couldn't recall seeing it afterwards and decided that it was in Debbie's car.

I didn't really worry too much - I was certain that it was in Debbie's boot - and so went to bed with an easy mind.

At 1am the telephone rang. It was the manager of the Café Beaubourg.

Now I know I'd been there for a drink earlier in the evening, and that they obviously appreciated my patronage - however, I did think it was a bit much to be ringing me at such an hour to thank me for my visit. Turns out that that wasn't the purpose of the call.

Apparently they had found my bag. Apparently I'd left it there in a moment of giddiness.

Well, luckily it's an honest establishment, given how the bag contained a full life support system of passport, wallet, keys, DSi, Blackberry charger and a small insignificant thing called my work laptop.

On top of all that is the bag itself - a lovely Lancel number. It's worth a pretty penny and was a gift from le FP in our early days. Yikes. Well done them for being honest.

The next day, I went to collect my bag. I took the opportunity to meet up with an old flame that many of you will remember - Skaterboy. He works in the neighbourhood so meeting up for a boisson seemed like a good idea.

When he arrived, I looked at him and started to wonder what I'd seen in him all that time ago. He's cute enough, but, to be honest, he's not my type. He's thin - and I really don't like thin. And he's nerdy. Although I quite like that. Plus he looked like he needed a good wash. I really don't like that.

He sat down next to me.

"So you got your bag back then?" he said.

"Yeah, thank goodness" I replied. "le FP was about to kill me for losing one of the first gifts he ever bought me".

"I got the best ever gift from my boyfriend this Christmas" Skater boy said.

I never knew there was a boyfriend, but hey, it's not like I'm bothered (nor would I have been had he been mentioned at the time of our 'thing').

And then he started to tell me what his boyfriend had bought him.

A gun.

A rifle, to be exact.

A real one, from the German army. Decommissioned.

"Is it a modern gun?" I asked him.

"No," he replied, "It's from World War two".

"So it's a Nazi gun?"

"Yeah, a real classic".

"Right. A used Nazi rifle. And what exactly are you going to do with it?" At this point I was getting a bit worried.

Rightly so, it turned out.

"Oh, I'll be taking it out with me when I wear the uniform he bought me for my birthday" he said, cheerily.

"Let me get this right" I said. "You have a Nazi uniform that you wear outside the house and now you have a real-life-used-by-Nazis-nazi-rifle that you plan to wear with the Nazi uniform?"

"Yeah" he replied, enthusiastically "Cool, isn't it?"

I couldn't even begin to explain to him how this was so far from cool that it was off the scale.

I got the bill. I paid. I left.

I deleted his number.

Some things are best left to others to deal with, right?

Did someone order a threesome for two?

So. The new blog.

I kind of thought it was a good idea, but it didn't feel right. I felt like I was cheating on TBNIL. The goal was to find motivation to post, but it went the other way. I felt less motivated to post there than I did here.

So, fin bref, I'm back.

Back chez TBNIL and back in Paris after a huge trip to the states and Canada with le FP. And I'm back with tales to tell, you'll be happy to note.

Let's start with a wee tale of Los Angeles and how not to have a threesome with your boyfriend.

You see it all started really innocently. As do most things in my life (yeah, right).

Me and le FP had just arrived in LA and, as is our habit, we got online and started surfing the 'boyz' sites to try and find someone who could tell us where the best bars, clubs, etc in town are to be found. This is how we found Serge.

Serge was an American guy, born to French parents and desperate to communicate with someone (anyone) in French. He lived and worked in LA (in the movies, bien sûr) and we chatted for a while. He told us about some great bars (really great bars) and before signing off he invited us to go eat sushi with him.

Now me and le FP are both sushi freaks and we'd been craving some good maki rolls for a while. The offer was to good to turn down (plus Serge was cute...).

We ate sushi together, we drank drinks together and we flirted with each other - me with Serge, Serge with le FP, le FP with me, and so on....

Anyway, by the end of the evening, me and le FP had decided that he was a great guy, but that he wasn't going to be getting the ménage à trois that he was so obviously looking for.

So how he ended up using the bathroom in our hotel room is beyond me. Suffice to say I'd had a few drinks too many by this point.

As Serge slipped into the bathroom, le FP muttered something about having to make a phone call and he quickly disappeared off to the hotel lobby with a grin on his face.

He'd left me in the bedroom with Serge in the bathroom - and, trust me, he knew what was about to happen.

I, on the other hand, was pretty clueless and unsuspecting.

When Serge exited the bathroom completely naked I was somewhat taken aback.

When he got down on his knees and undid my jeans I was somewhat startled.

And then I was just kind of shocked.

I grabbed my phone and texted le FP...

"COME BACK TO THE ROOM. NOW!"

He did come back to the room. But only once I'd managed to extract my nethers from Serge's grip and sent him packing. Only then did le FP appear at the door, laughing hysterically.

He'd left me in the lurch with a lovestruck, horny, desperate American boy.

He'd skeedaddled when he knew that Serge would be making a move and that I was too drunk to be able to resist.

He thought this was the funniest thing ever.

I wasn't too sure that it was funny. But it certainly stuck in my mind for a couple of days afterwards....