And that's what's so cruel about Christmas. Because that just doesn't happen all that often. Sometimes my gift giving fu is something impressive. Most of the time it's just sad.
Obviously for many MANY years I couldn't really afford good gifts. Sometimes I couldn't afford ANY gifts. Last year was a bit of a crunch as I was hired in by the state just before the holidays. Normally that would be a good thing, but as a contract worker I got paid for the previous week's work. As a state employee I got paid every other week, and they more or less held back a week. So while my bills paid up, I went without a check for three weeks. When I did get that first check, the majority of it had to go to the bills that had accumulated, leaving only a bit for Christmas cheer. They year... oh this year though, I have a very high budget.
Unfortunately I'm just missing out on that creative spirit. I don't know what to get for anybody.
For Christmas, I give 8 gifts. Mom, my brothers R and B, my sister in law, my two nephews, and my niece. The nephews and niece are sadly easy. They are used to getting gift cards. I personally don't get it... but they just adore getting money to go out and spend as they see fit. So this year the they simply get bigger ones. The nephews each get Steam gift cards and my niece gets one from Ulta. Ulta, in case you didn't know, is a big makeup store in the local mall. And if you've never been, you should go... hell it could be a major location in just about any TG story!
For R I got a little screwed. Mom is very anal when it comes to shopping. Every year she ensures that she spends the same amount of money on each of her sons. This year she had everybody's shopping done, but found a last minute thing for R. She really wanted to give it to him, but it would mean spending more on him than B and I. So I stepped in and 'bought' one of her other gifts for R. Yeah, he'll like it, but deep down I'll always know it was more of a gift to Mom than for R.
That leaves B, his wife, and mom. With Mom, one thing she's wanted for awhile is a remote starter for her car. Sadly those things are just expensive and exceed the amount any of us spend on each other. It's also one of those convenient life features that she'll never get for herself. So R, B, and myself all went in together and got her one. It's a really nice one that has a long range (a lot of power for the transmitter), and had two way communication. That means that when she hits the button to turn on the car, the car will send back a message saying it's been turned on. No more hitting the button and just hoping that it started up only to find a cold car waiting for you!
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| Give The Pony! |
That leaves B and his wife. And I'm stuck... I just don't know what to get them. In years past I've come up with stuff that they would absolutely love. Stuff that they didn't ask for or even think to ask for, but really really wanted.
And as we're drawing to a close, I think I have to just bite the bullet and get them gift cards. Amazon for her, and something Michigan Football related for him.
R and I talked a bit a couple days ago that maybe it's time that we dropped the whole Christmas gift idea for each other. We'd still get Mom and the kids gifts, but each other? We're just not very good at it. I'm fairly sure that I'm getting a gift card from R. If it wasn't for the damned 'mom' gift I'd probably be getting him a gift card. If we correctly guess the amounts, we're more or less giving each other nothing.
You see, for the first time as adults, we're all (R, B, and I) happily employed. We all make enough money to get what we want. If we don't get it ourselves, its either because we don't really want it or it's simply too expensive. Either way there's not a lot of room left for gift's.
We all want to give great gifts. None of us really want to receive gifts. This will probably be the last year of gift giving for us 'boys'.
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