All the sales in the world aren’t going to change the fact that I don’t know what to get folks for Christmas yet. My wife hasn’t given me The List(tm) yet, for one thing.
Here’s how The List(tm) works. My wife makes a sort of “dear santa” list of all the things she wants. Then I go out and buy everything on the list, wrap it up, and give it to her.
This works because she’s reasonable about it. It’s not all that exorbitant — she knows where the money is really coming from — and I’m spared any sort of decision-making, which is all a man can ask.
My kids, who only have the most vague notion of money, have already prepared multi-paged single-spaced letters to santa. They started in May and have made several drafts. Last week, they were finally put in the mail. This is where I mention that the “American Girl” Doll Company is more evil that Halliburton, BlackWater, and Exxon put together.
I, unfortunately for all who love me, never make a Christmas list until the last possible moment, and then it mostly involves random post-its in the Eddie Bauer catalog. So, I invariably get a bunch of stuff I didn’t really want, because nobody knows what I want.
Well, everyone does know what I want, but having my way with Guo Jingjing on a water bed, on the beach, surrounded by plates of nachos while serenaded by a personal concert performed by The Faces isn’t terribly practical, so I don’t hold out much hope I’ll find that under the tree.
So, why don’t I get what I want? Perhaps it’s some sort of mild watered-down anhedonia mixed with the usual guy-philosophy of “If I want something, I’ll just buy it, rather than wait for someone else to buy it for me.”
So, what about you–do you have your lists ready? Do you know what you want, and do you know what to get everyone else?
Go ahead, twist the dagger. Tell me you’ve got it all figured out.
