Oh, Christmas time, you're the Pink Elephant for overspending and proving that money spent equals how much someone loves you.

I understand that, if someone has the ability to buy it, they can go for it.

But I don't understand spending several thousand dollars on ONE gift, and still getting other gifts for them.
Maybe they think that, the more expensive it is, the more they're proving their love.

Me, I'm glad that my idea of love is not money based. Excluding shipping gifts out, I spent less than $50 and made ten gifts. The 'big' gift for Ma Mere, the supplies I used were free. Ma Mere won't see it as me being cheap, she'll see it as I spent a month making it and won't care about the price.



Christmas bitching! A lovely idea!!! I am also hand-making gifts this year. Not everything, but a lot of it. I'm stressed to the max and hoping that by the time the big day comes I will be able to settle in and roll with it in an enjoyable manner. I hope. The older I get the faster December flies by and the less I enjoy it. I feel like a grinch for saying that. I know it's all "in" right now to grinch on Christmas and make Scrooge-y faces and what-not, but it's just not me to do that. I don't have any animosity toward Christmas I just don't have that giddy Christmas spirit that I had several years ago. I miss it. Lots.

What disturbs me the most is the relief I feel after all the Christmas decorations and things have been cleaned up and put away. I relish the return of my usual space whereas there was a time not all that long ago that I felt sad when the tree went away.

Dear Santa, this year I'd just like my Christmas spirit back and to not burn my wrists or the top of my hands taking the freaking ham out of the oven.


I’m sick and tired of having it shoved down my throat that I need to donate and volunteer at this time of year. You have no idea what I do or how I spend my money when I’m not at work or in your orbit so butt out.

I’m not a bad person because I’m not spending time at the church, nursing home or homeless shelter. Maybe it makes YOU feel good to email/extoll the wonderful feeling you get from doing such but I don’t feel the need to tell everyone about every little good deed that I do.

And it’s not nice to belittle people for donating money to places instead of physically volunteering. Doesn’t the soup kitchen need money to buy the food that you are so wonderful to serve? I know that the shelter animals need to be walked and played with but doesn’t it take money to pay for their vaccinations and food? Wouldn’t all the organizations have a bit of a pickle on their hands if everyone decided to donate time instead of a few recluses donating money too?

I was this close to doing a payroll deduction to donate to the organization that you work with (my employer will match up to $1000 per year) and then your email came rolling in where you talked down about people “throwing money” at problems instead of "getting their hands dirty". Fine. I’ll keep my money in my pocket.

So I didn’t pick an angel off the angel tree...I happen to actually know a family going through a rough time and decided to help them with their Christmas instead. But you don’t know that, do you? If I was a real tightwad meanie, I’d just pick a fucking angel off of the tree because it would be a hell of a lot cheaper.

Maybe I do random nice shit all year long when funds allow and not just at Christmas. My own husband doesn’t know about most of the things that I do because it’s not even any of his business.

You can take your candy cane and stick it where the sun doesn’t shine.

As I sit here trying to force my cold medicine fog induced brain to think of Christmas gifts, I really can't think of any truly awful Christmas gifts that I have received. I have already covered the dead grandma's shoes from my Mother-in-law. And really, it doesn't get any worse than that for creepy.

The second Christmas that my exhusband and I were together was the first time that my father met him when he stayed a few days with us.

Ex spent every spare moment drunk with his cousin.

The tree was up, there were presents for him under it but not a single thing for me. We’d put our stockings up at the same time the tree went up and the plan was to fill them for each other up til Christmas morning and then look into them. His stocking was nice and bulky and mine didn’t have a damn thing in it.

My father was kind of curious as to why there still wasn’t anything for me under the tree when December 23rd rolled around. Ex comes home with something wrapped up that looks like a giant can. He is drunk and tells us that he bought a can of beans while he was out. His cousin keeps telling him that he should get me something else but Ex says that I love him so much that I’d like anything, even a can of beans, for Christmas.

The mood is kind of strained around the house for the next day and a half. The only thing for me from Ex was that package.

I start to open it and get it about halfway open when I see that it REALLY does look like a can of food. My father asks Ex if he needs to take a few minutes to get me something else or did he really want me to finish opening the present. Drunken Ex says I should go on and open it.

It wasn’t beans. It was perfume that came in a container that looked like a can and drunken Ex thought he had played the best joke EVER.

It was a shitty present because the week leading up to it was horrid.

I still wear that kind of perfume occasionally. Current Husband likes it but I don’t think I’ve ever told him the story of how I was introduced to the perfume.

Men, let me let you in on a teeny-tiny little secret.

Lingerie?

Not an acceptable gift.

Especially when it's crotchless thongs (two sizes too big) and the world's ugliest teddy with ugly gold hearts sewn on the removable cups.

Because that shit? Means you'll be getting the freeze out, on ALL fronts.

He said he was trying to be subtle about sex.

Subtle as a fucking brick to the head.

Worst Christmas gifts ever are the topic this week. I'd love to say "my sister" but that's mean and she was born in September so it doesn't quite work. ;)

I should preface this by saying that if you get someone Christmas ornaments or Christmas decorations FOR Christmas - it's a bad gift. I'm sorry... I'm a Christmas enthusiast and to unwrap even the most gorgeous or adorable Christmas decoration ON CHRISTMAS is like winning a free box of fireworks July 15th. I don't want to have to wait a whole year to use anything!

As well-intention as my stepmother is and as thoughtful and wonderful as she can be... she's really bad about giving Christmas decorations on Christmas. It's okay, I have a system now, those gifts get put behind the tree so that when I take down all the Christmas decorations they get put into the boxes with the rest.

Except for a couple of years ago when I received bizarre looking santa coats with santa heads on the top and snowmen bodies with heads attached as well. It took a bit for me to figure out that they were dining room chair covers and the following Christmas I got a red table cloth trimmed in white faux fur complete with Santa's black belt printed down the middle. *sigh*

My husband recently asked, "I wonder if she ever wonders why we don't use those?"

We're covered. We have one of those huge, chunky, heavy wood dining tables with the farmhouse style benches on either side since we have an "eat in" kitchen that is open to the living room it made sense to go less formal for our dining arrangement. In short, we have no dining room chairs to adorn with such festive chair covers.

The table cloth doesn't come close to fitting on the table. Another save.

Barely.

It was November of 1994. My sister and I were walking around the local Wallyworld and decided to check out their fabulous jewelry selection. We are looking around and realize that pretty much everything we saw was ugly as the day is long.

I wander down to the birthstone jewelry. I’d been looking for a birthstone ring for myself for awhile. That is when I spy the most hideous ring I’d ever laid eyes on. It’s my birthstone (peridot) and in a cut that I can’t stand. Marquise cut. (Something about those pointy ends have always freaked me out. I like my gemstones nice and round. Not pointy and mean.) The entire design of the ring is revolting.

My sister walks up and asks what I’m looking at. I show her and tell her that I wouldn’t wear it if it was given to me.

Fast forward to December 25, 1994. First Christmas with my exhusband. Guess what my present was?

I wore it anyway. I was secretly relieved when the stone chipped on something so I had an excuse to not wear it anymore. In retrospect, if he couldn’t remember my insane rant about marquise cut gemstones freaking me out when we were talking about engagement rings...I guess he really didn’t listen to me much.

A few years later, he spent the whole week drunk with his buddies while my dad was visiting us for the holiday and didn't put a present for me under the tree til Christmas Eve. It was shaped like a can of beans. He told me and my dad that it was a can of beans. I opened it to find perfume. I was disappointed that it really wasn't beans so I could throw them at him for contributing to such a shitty week.

In polite society we never recognize bad gifts. Even though we really want to sometimes, right? I have to admit to feeling guilty just implying that I might want to recognize a bad gift. It's rude when someone gives you something to do anything less than welcome it with open arms and thank the giver profusely. This entire code of politeness backfires completely when gift givers knowingly work it against you. It allows for an entire realm of shitty-ness that I'm sure Emily Post never even considered.

Like the time my mother-in-law brought over a box of deodorant from a local warehouse store. She announced that she no longer used this type of deodorant because "they" (they = whoever she recognized as a current authority on whatever bullshit subject she was yammering about) said it "caused cancer."

Make no mistake, my MIL hates me. But, she's also stupid and I can see where she probably believed I wouldn't connect her animosity toward me with the box of "carcinogenic" material she brought into my house as a "gift" for me. The really funny part (if you like dark humor) is that my MIL already had breast cancer and it had come back after ten years. So here she is with cancer worried that she was going to what? Get more? Lots of people want to detox when they have cancer. But, who looks around and says, "These cabinets here contain loads of cancer causing agents, who am I going to give these to?"

Then there was the muumuu from Hawaii that my mother brought back from vacation. I had asked for a Hawaiian sundress, something really local. Instead I got this horrific looking white thing with huge royal blue flowers that looked like something Mrs. Roper would have worn on Three's Company. Worse yet, the tag said "MADE IN KOREA." My mother has great taste, but she was pissed at me for some unknown reason and on top of that wanted to make some subtle comment on my weight because I wasn't still a perfect size 4 and 125lbs that I was when I was fifteen.

Then there was my 27th birthday. My birthday falls shortly after Christmas and I've spent my entire life with less than stellar birthday presents because of it's proximity to the biggest gift giving holiday of the year. I'm really okay with it, I mean, what am I going to do about it anyway, right? And, of course, it's the thought that counts and blah, blah, blah.

That birthday my husband had about $70 to spend on a present for me. Of all these "bad gifts" this one really, really deserves a good guilt trip on my part because if ever it were the "thought that counts" this one was it. My husband chose quantity over quality and I received several birthday gifts that year. The list included a tortilla warmer, a heating pad, candles, and cheap bubble bath. Each gift had a thought and purpose behind it. The tortilla warmer was because I make really good tacos. The heating pad was for my ankle I broke years ago that tends to cause trouble for me in the winter. He had heard me saying I wanted more candles so he bought me the ugliest blue candles I have ever seen, but it was sweet of him to remember my mentioning candles. The bubble bath was on sale.

The important thing and the reason I shouldn't even list my husband's gifts here is that his thought was well-intentioned, sweet, and filled with consideration. He wasn't trying to kill me and he wasn't trying to tell me what an enormous fat ass I had become. It was simply done out of love... which is probably why I still speak to him. I can't say that for the other two.