IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO BUY CHRISTMAS GIFTS FOR GEORGE

I think everyone is acquainted with a person who’s nearly impossible to Christmas shop for – someone who either has no hobbies or interests or who is so fussy, he or she hates just about everything.

For years, that person on my list has been George.

George is in his late 70s and is a dear family friend who’s always been extremely generous with his gifts for us. But the minute I think about Christmas shopping for him, I break out in hives.

The first few years, it wasn’t too bad. For one thing, George collected Titanic memorabilia. So I bought him everything and anything I could find about the Titanic – photos, posters, puzzles, books. I probably even would have gone on Ebay and bid on a frozen chunk of the iceberg the ship hit…if I could have figured out how to wrap it up for George for Christmas.

But then came the fateful day he said, “I’m tired of my Titanic collection. In fact, I’m going to sell everything. I’m sick of looking at the stuff.”

My heart sank (pun intended), especially since I’d just ordered a framed mirror with the Titanic hand-painted on it.

“But I’ve decided to start collecting wooden replicas of old sailing ships and tall ships now,” he said.

My spirits rose slightly. I checked the Internet to see what I could find out about the wooden ships.

I found out they cost just about as much as a new human-sized speedboat.

Nevertheless, I saved my pennies, and the next Christmas, I bought George a replica of the Cutty Sark. And the year after that, it was a replica of the USS Constitution, followed by the HMS Victory. To my delight, he “oohed” and “aahed” over each of them. I was thrilled.

But a few months later, George’s best friend told me about a garage sale the two of them were having together, and emailed me a photo of all of the things they had gathered to sell. There, sitting on one of the yard-sale tables, were the ships I’d bought for George – the same ships I had sacrificed going to the movies – and basically, eating – for, so I could afford them.

“Well, they were really nice, but they turned out to be dust collectors,” George explained when I asked him about the ships. “And at my age, I’ve decided it’s time to start getting rid of stuff instead of collecting it.”

Once he stopped collecting things, that’s when my headaches began. I thought gift cards would be the answer to all of my problems, so I bought him one to a store he usually visited at least three times a week.

“I hate gift cards,” he said. “They make me feel as if the person who bought them was too lazy to put any thought or effort into the gift. Also, they are embarrassing to use. I usually just toss them out. I mean, I wouldn’t insult anyone else by giving the cards to them.”

Toss them out?  I couldn’t believe my ears! I was ready to go fish his trash barrels to reclaim my gift.

I noticed that most of his clothes were in a camouflage pattern, so I asked him about it one day.

“I love camouflage,” he said. “It’s all I wear now.” 

So the next Christmas, I bought him a nice hooded jacket in a camouflage pattern, with a winter hat to match.

His expression when he opened the gifts, however, resembled that of someone who’d just found rat droppings in his cereal. I had the distinct feeling his next words weren’t going to be, “Ooh! I love these!”

Unfortunately, I was right.

“I wear only military camouflage,” he said tightly. “And not the fake stuff. I wear the real government-issued camouflage clothing. This shirt and hat are hunters’ camouflage, not the official military one. I don’t hunt. I don’t kill animals!”

Heck, I’d always thought camouflage was camouflage. If you could hide in the bushes while wearing it and blend in with the trees, then it was fine to me – but obviously not for George. And how was I supposed to get official military camouflage clothing anyway? Go mug a Marine?

“Make a donation to his favorite charity,” one of my friends suggested the next year when I mentioned I would rather be rolled in honey and staked near a swarm of killer bees than to have to shop for a Christmas gift for George once again. “He can’t complain about a gift like that. It would make him look worse than Scrooge!”

I thought she might have a good idea. So I tried to find out which charities George favored.

“Do you ever donate to any charities?” I asked him one day, trying to sound casual.

He shook his head and frowned. “The trouble with charities,” he said, “is you can’t tell the legitimate ones from the ones that are trying to rip you off. So I decided not to trust any of them and not donate at all. I’ve also decided to follow my father’s advice that charity begins at home!”

I rolled my eyes. It was official. George had just broken the world’s record for being the most impossible person on earth to buy a gift for.

So this year, when Christmas-shopping time rolled around once again, I stopped worrying about George. I knew that no matter what I bought him, he would hate it, so I decided to quit needlessly wasting money on him and just buy him some cheap stuff. That way, if he tossed it out, it wouldn’t be as painful to my wallet.

It took me all of 10 minutes to shop for his gifts because frankly, I didn’t care any more. I bought him a couple of his favorite candy bars, a few seed packets of his favorite garden flowers, some birdseed for his bird feeder, and a pouch of his favorite pipe tobacco. The total cost was less than $20. Then I wrapped the gifts and tossed them into a bigger box and wrapped that. I didn’t even think about George or his gifts again until Christmas.

“Fantastic!” he exclaimed when he opened them. “I LOVE everything!”

I honestly nearly needed CPR.

So this year will go down in history as the year I finally pleased George with my gifts.

But if you know of anyone who wants to buy a mirror with a hand-painted picture of the Titanic on it, just let me know.

 

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THE FOOLPROOF HOLIDAY BAKING GUIDE

(Note: This is reprinted from my book, Happy Holidays! Now Hand me my Tranquilizers!, which was published back in 2013).


I was watching a cooking show on TV the other night, and the woman, wearing a crisp, white apron and a pearl necklace, was giving pointers on how to efficiently manage baking time and minimize stress during the holiday season. She recommended getting the time-consuming chore of baking out of the way at least two weeks prior to Christmas, then freezing everything.  She even suggested setting up and adhering to a strict baking schedule to make the chore go more smoothly.

The truth is, “baking” is a 4-letter word to me. After seeing the creations that have emerged from my oven over the years, I truly believe my stove might benefit from a visit from an exorcist. Still, glutton for torture that I am, I find myself baking – or at least attempting to – every holiday season.

If, as the cooking expert suggested, I were to write out a holiday baking schedule and a step-by-step “how-to” guide, it would look something like this:

Dec. 10:  Head to the supermarket and buy enough flour, sugar (granulated, powdered, and brown), butter, food coloring, decorative candies, and cookie cutters to open your own Sarah Lee outlet.


Dec. 11 -9:15 a.m. – Put on a sweatshirt and sweatpants, tie your hair back in a pony tail and slip into your favorite apron – even the one that has so many stains on it (some of which date back to Thanksgiving of 1982), it looks as if it’s been decorated with a map of a Brazilian rain forest.


9:30 a.m. - Clean out any petrified food remnants from the oven.  Just to be safe, cover all smoke detectors with thick towels or plastic wrap before turning on the oven. Preheat to 350 degrees. When the oven stops smoking, start baking.


10:00 a.m. – Quadruple the ingredients in your cookie recipe. Can’t figure out how to multiply 1/8 teaspoon by four? Then just make an educated guess. It shouldn’t matter…much. Mix all cookie ingredients together in a bowl about the size of a washtub.  Use your hands to form the dough into a ball that's about the size of a basketball and weighs approximately 15 pounds.


10:18 a.m. - Tear the dough apart as you frantically search for one of your artificial fingernails, which you just noticed is missing.


10:20 a.m. - Sprinkle a sheet of waxed paper with flour, then heave the ball of dough onto it.  With a rolling pin, roll out the dough to a thickness of about ¼ inch.


10:30 a.m. - With a butter knife, pry the ball of dough from the rolling pin, to which it is now clinging as if it were made of quick-drying cement.  Completely cover the dough with flour and once again attempt to roll it out.


10:45 a.m. - Select festive Santa, reindeer, Christmas tree and star-shaped cookie cutters, and begin to cut out cookies from the dough.


10:55 a.m. - Dig Santa’s decapitated head out of the cookie cutter and stick it onto his body, reshaping it with your fingers.  Don’t worry if he looks as if he’s been in some tragic, disfiguring accident or if Rudolph has only three legs.  You can cover any imperfections with frosting later on.


11:10 a.m. - Pop the cookies into the oven.


11:18 a.m. - Check the cookies.  If they’re nearly black on the bottoms and still pale and raw on the tops, then they’re baking normally for most ovens.


11:25 a.m. - Remove the cookies from the oven and allow them to cool. As they do, they should become as hard as Pinocchio’s head.


11:35 a.m. - With a spatula, gently lift the cookies from the cookie sheets, making sure to collect any pieces that break off so you can be reattach them with frosting.


11:45 a.m. - Mix powdered sugar, water, milk and butter together to make the frosting. When the spoon stands up straight in the bowl, the frosting is about the right consistency.  Divide the frosting into four small bowls and add drops of different food colorings to each.  Fill a cake-decorating tube with frosting.


12:00 p.m. - Slowly squeeze the tube, applying even pressure. Continue to squeeze until the veins pop out on your forehead and your hand goes numb.  Only then will the first signs of frosting actually appear at the tip of the tube.


12:10 p.m. - Clean up the huge blob of frosting that shoots like a cannonball out of the tube and hits the refrigerator door.  Lose your temper and viciously attack the decorating tube, stabbing it with a knife and ripping it open.  With your fingers, smear frosting all over the cookies.  Use colored sprinkles and those little silver candy balls that look like BB-gun ammunition to strategically conceal any flaws.


12:30 p.m. - Stand back and admire your handiwork.  Watch the red frosting seep into the green frosting and turn it to a yucky shade of brown.  Watch Santa’s beard absorb the red frosting and turn pink.  Reject and eat any cookies that don’t meet your high standards. 

12:45 p.m. - Vow that if your stomach cramps ever subside, you’ll never again eat 23 broken cookies in 15 minutes.


1:00 p.m. - Carefully wrap the remaining cookies and gently place them in the freezer.


Dec. 24:  9:00 a.m. - Open the freezer and discover that you accidentally set a 22-pound turkey on top of the cookies and pulverized them.


9:30 a.m. - Head to the nearest bakery, buy a few dozen festively decorated cookies and pass them off as your own homemade ones.

Then pray no one asks you for the recipe.


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