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by Mak Faene Next time you're in your local department and/or furniture store, just try to find a good stereo cabinet that isn't completely designed for Television owners. It's impossible. Now this is not at all a concern of mine, it's just a matter of fact. It's entirely reasonable in a civilization who's belief system pivots around the dependency on mass media that something as vernacular as furniture should be designed to suit the requirements of the hypnotic pendulum of Television. This is just yet one more thing my eyes are open to now that I've rid myself of the networks' shackles. It was time to get the stereo system off the living room floor and into a suitable cabinet so I found myself visiting many furniture stores. Every store I went to sold the same design regurgitated into different faux-wood finishes over the same particle board. A large rectangular hole is what the cabinet was designed around. All these gaping vacant shelves were hungry for the glowing boxes found chattering in the next department over. I stood in contemplation over how I could otherwise fill that space. A plant may be nice, but my apartment is dark as it is; not much would survive in that dark niche. A fish tank? Nah. I dwelled upon it some more before getting fed up. Trying to fit something in what would clearly be wasted space in my home was just so counter productive, so I abandoned my hunt and contemplate my next move as I exited the last store. I ended up at the local hardware store - well, the local hardware mega-depot. I had to pick up some light bulbs for the bathroom as it was, but while I was there I took notice of some utilitarian shelves they had for sale. For $29 I walked away with my new stereo cabinet; or shelf unit as it were. There were metal shelf sets but I opted for the unfinished wood variety - more warm and cozy. Well, not so cozy actually, by "unfinished wood" they weren't kidding around; the wood was so rough and prickly with splinters that I probably could have used it to sand my floor. But that's okay, no sweat, I've got work gloves... So the box in which these parts came, indicated that the only tool needed to assemble my new shelf set was a Philips-head screw driver, this I had. What they failed to mention on the box was that you'd also need a power drill, unless, of course, you're some kind of cyborganic creature that has a fully rotating wrist with about five hundred pounds of torque, this i did not have. Could have gone out and purchased a drill, but I'd had enough of shopping for this month, so I did what any male ego would do when challenged: I settled in and screwed thirty two, two inch screws through solid wood with only a screw driver. It took a couple of hours and when I was done my hands were bleeding and my palms were both bruised from the butt of the screw driver. But I'd put together my perfect (wobbling) stereo shelf. No wasted space from a gaping Television hole, just my old hand-me-down turn table and a pile of vinyl records to sooth my pain and fill my living room. |
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