Smells like Ikea

Yes, it smells like Ikea. You know what I'm talking about. It's not as nice as new car smell but it's close. As promised, here is the update on the kitchen. It’s fabulous! Having a real kitchen, like real human beings and not like college students, makes such a difference! I’ve posted some before and after photos so you can all see what I’m talking about. Isn’t it great! 100% Ikea. And the best thing about it is that I never even had to set foot in the Ikea store. I looked at the catalogue, tried to download the design feature but failed miserably. So I painstakingly used the cut and paste (I mean literally with scissors and glue, grid paper, you get the idea) model they had in the back of the catalogue to pick the cabinets and their correct sizes. I hired this polish guy, Stefan, gave him the item numbers and he went to Ikea to get everything. Then he brought them all back to the apartment, assembled and installed them in 2.5 days! There are a few minor issues but who cares! I have actual counter space and cabinets... imagine that! The biggest issue was that Stefan, who I thought was a charming eastern european with a funny accent turned out to be kind of psychotic. He refused to take any responsibility for any problems that occurred during the process. When the kitchen sink was leaking he said it couldn't possibly have been him. It was the dish washer, for sure, and he didn't touch that. Even though the kitchen was bone dry before he started work on it and I had certainly been using the dish washer. At some point, he must have cut his hand because he went down to get something from his truck and there was a bloody rag on the sink. When he came back up, his hand was all taped up with masking tape, smears of blood coming out the sides of it. Whenever I pointed something out that I didn't think was quite right he would look at me with this weird smile, like I was completely insane and life isn't perfect and I should try maybe to spend a winter in a Polish prison and then I would not be so concerned about the height of my stove or the flood under my sink. C'est normal. Non? Anyways, it's done, for now. We need to get some things for the walls and accessories for the counter. Oh, and we could use some new dishes that aren't all cracked (maybe I should send the old ones to the Polish holding cell block where they can appreciate them), perhaps some serving pieces. But the point is, I have a kitchen now and not a mini bar from the prison's isolation room.