I’m a horrible gift giver. I’ve mentioned before that I buy things I want to get, which is subconsciously greedy, I know. But if I manage to get things the receiver actually wants (usually through HEAVY hinting and suggestion), I always manage to destroy the act of surprise.<\/p>\n
I drop too many cautionary suggestions (“You know those underwear you liked? I think you should just forget about buying them.”); or I ask too many questions (“That camera you looked at last week. Did it have a serial number you can remember off the top of your head?”); or in the case of home-made, hear felt gifts, I execute their creation waaay too early (“You may want to wear this now – it’s a scarf I made you!”); or I just leave the damn things lying around without trying to hide them (“What’s this Charlie’s Angels Season One<\/em> doing here?”), all resulting in the most anti-climactic surprise for the recipient.<\/p>\n So when I finished wrapping the gifts last night for someone’s impending birthday, this someone systematically picked them up and one by one and identified nearly each gift:<\/p>\n (Fondle) “That book I wanted.” Damn it!<\/p>\n My own fault, really. I can’t go up against the master. He had my iPhone sitting beside my bed (hardly hidden) for at least 3 weeks before my birthday with not one mention or hint to me about it. Subsequently I was blindsided, twice (he got me a decoy gift which he also didn’t let on, but gave to me early – the Wii). Cool as a cucumber, he sat on these gifts for a long time without hint of their impending coolness.<\/p>\n Me? I think in terms of the happiness. I’m bursting to see the payoff, but I get disappointed when the recipient makes the all too easy connection: “Want to see what I got you? No? Darn! It’s really cool! It makes toast and is toaster-like! What? No. It’s not a toaster! Fttt!”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m a horrible gift giver. I’ve mentioned before that I buy things I want to get, which is subconsciously greedy, I know. But if I manage to get things the receiver actually wants (usually through HEAVY hinting and suggestion), I always manage to destroy the act of surprise. I drop too many cautionary suggestions (“You […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":430,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[289,286,292,291,290,295,288,2019,301,299,293,294,297,302,303,296,298,300,287],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9WjY-wo","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2008"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/430"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2008\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deadrobot.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n(Shake) “Socks. Probably green.”
\n(Lift, bend) “That t-shirt I said I liked.”
\n(Hold, weigh) “Not sure.”
\n(Hold, poke) “Not sure.”
\n(Passing to side) “Charlie’s Angels.”
\n(Passing to side) “Charlie’s Angels.”
\n(Lift, bend) “Padded CD case?”<\/p>\n