Worst gift, 2008

The nastiest, most foul-smelling excuse for a breakfast food on this planet.

Here ya' go:

Her grandmother really is a strange one.

I have an ex-aunt who would buy the most outrageous, off the wall gifts in the world. And she would usually get them from Goodwill, probably. Like when she gave me and my brother -- I was 16 and he was 23 -- Hot Wheels for Christmas. She usually gave us money, too, so we dealt with it fine.

 

My sister bought me four DVDs and while normally that would have been great, the selection of movies was terrible.

1.) Candy Strippers (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0463935/)
2.) Where the Truth Lies (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0373450/)
3.) The Dark (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0411267/)

and, as a joke gift "I <3 Tx Girls" which she lovingly described as "Fat girl porn".

I asked her why she got me fat girl porn and she responded: "Fat girls need love too."

 

My parents tend to be a little off, but this year it didn't affect me too badly. Sure, there were the stockings (rubber bouncy balls, reindeer boxing pens, Legos, an unidentifiable cheap ornament thingy, and of course a toothbrush) which prove they really want grandchildren and will continue to treat us like we're six until they get some. But the best/worst gift went to my brother:

A rain outfit. He walks to work daily, sometimes in inclement weather. Instead of getting him, you know, an umbrella, they bought him a head-to-toe rain outfit to wear over his work clothes. Apparently it is a very nice, very expensive rain outfit, the type that hikers might wear during monsoon season. He does not live anywhere near the equator. This is hysterical.

 

One year, my mother and I got each other a Trivial Pursuit game.

 

My sister and her husband got a glass picture frame that had a gift receipt in it dated 8/1/00 from Kaufmann's, a now defunct department store. They think it was a wedding gift from his sister's wedding. We also don't think they knew the gift receipt was in it, as it was taped in a not-so-obvious place.

They're thinking of re-gifting it back to them next year, as a joke.

 

Athsma attack triggered by a viral infection. Merry Christmas, son.

 

Along the same lines, the back spasm after lunch/Christmas dinner that had me bedridden so badly that I had to call in to work yesterday. Oh, that was not fun.

 

My brother got me NCAA '08 for PS2. I opened it right before he jetted off to the Cayman Islands. He drove his car to the airport which had the PS2 controllers in it.

Damn him.

 

I have a rain outfit for when I am coaching the track team. It is the greatest thing in the world. Also come in handy during the monsoon in September.

 

UPS' failed systems. I was supposed to receive my digital camera (replacing the one that died on my last work trip) the 24th, but they claimed a BS weather excuse. Now it's on the Eastside and in some effing warehouse where I can't go pick it up but it's not on a truck today and they don't know when it will get on one to be delivered.

Oh, and I leave again Sunday for my next trip.

Eff UPS.

 

Not a spasm, but my back has been similarly painful lately. I tweaked it shoveling last weekend.

 

Damn, FT. Just damn.

Not exactly a horrible gift because any book with tornado and lightning pictures is OK in my book, but I specifically asked for the NEW Extreme Weather book and instead got an old library-used, previous incarnation of a book with the same name.

I try to be specific ... :