Sally Breslin: My Life: THE WORST CHRISTMAS-GIFT IDEA I'VE EVER HAD

Seeing that it’s nearly November already, I probably should be thinking about ideas for Christmas gifts to buy for everyone on my list. But the truth is, I’m afraid, very afraid.

Those of you who regularly read this blog are aware that when it comes to buying Christmas gifts, my talent for finding great ones, on a scale of 1-10, currently ranks at about a minus 20.

For example, there was the blown-glass bowling-pin and bowling-ball ornament I ordered for my mother, who was on a bowling league. It ended up looking exactly like a turkey drumstick and an apple. When I gave it to Mom, she thought it was an ornament of someone’s lunch. Then there was the painting of a buffalo I paid an artist (at least he’d said he was an artist) to create for my husband, who collected buffalo/bison items. The finished product was done so poorly, the poor buffalo looked as if had unsuccessfully tried to run across a highway directly in the path of a speeding 18-wheeler.

I could go on, but you get the idea. The other day, however, I was thinking about the very worst example of Christmas shopping gone bad I’d ever experienced. To be honest, I’ve always been too embarrassed to write about it, but seeing it happened nearly 25 years ago, I think I finally have the courage to discuss it…and totally humiliate myself in the process.

It pertains to my brilliant idea for a gift for my husband that ended up involving the police, a shotgun, and my name deserving a permanent spot in the “Dumbest Shoppers in the History of the World” Hall of Fame.

It all began when my husband and a group of his friends decided to take up skeet shooting as a weekend hobby, which resulted in my husband buying an expensive 12-gauge shotgun. Even though the gun cost him a small fortune, he had only a really inexpensive “leatherette” case to carry it in. It looked so flimsy, I was afraid if he sneezed while carrying it, the handles would fall off.

So I came up with what I thought was a brilliant Christmas gift idea for him…a hand-tooled leather shotgun case with his initials and a buffalo on the front of it.

On a Monday morning about four weeks before Christmas, I “borrowed” my husband’s shotgun (after he left for work) and headed to a leather-supply store on Elm Street in Manchester. I wasn’t too worried about my husband missing the gun because he’d stored the gun way in the back of the hall closet for winter hibernation.

The guy working at the leather store looked young, probably in his early 20s. I explained exactly what I wanted and asked him if he knew of anyone who could make such a gun case for me.

“I can,” he said matter-of-factly. “In fact, I’m a master craftsman. It’ll take about two weeks and cost you around $100.”

“Great!” I practically gushed, thrilled that I’d so quickly found someone, and a “master” at that, who not only was willing to take on the project, he also wasn’t going to force me to have to take out a second mortgage to pay for it.

“If you don’t mind,” he said, “I’d like you to leave the gun here so I can fit the case precisely to it, step by step. as I work on it.”

“Fine,” I said. “Do you need a down-payment?”

He shook his head. “No, you can pay me only when you pick it up, after you check it out and make sure it’s done to your satisfaction. Let me take down your name and phone number, and I’ll call you when it’s ready.”

I left the store, smiling to myself. This gift, I decided, finally was going to be one my husband would absolutely love. And, unlike every other gift I’d bought him in previous years, this one was guaranteed to be a big surprise, something he couldn’t possibly guess. I was pretty proud of myself.

All I had to do was keep my him from discovering that his gun was missing from the closet.

Three weeks passed and there still was no word from the guy at the leather store. I realized he’d told me he’d call me when the case was ready, but I thought it couldn’t hurt to call and check on his progress.

A much older-sounding man with a deep voice answered the phone.

“I was wondering if my gun case is ready yet?” I asked him.

He asked for my name, then checked. “Sorry, I don’t see any record of an order for you here,” he said. “What’s the job number on your invoice?”

I felt the color drain from my face. I hadn’t even realized until that very moment that I didn’t have an invoice. In fact, I had no paperwork whatsoever to prove I’d even been in the store.

“I-I don’t have an invoice,” I said. “But let me talk to the young blonde guy who works there. He’ll know all about it. He’s the one who’s making the gun case for me.”

“Sorry, but he doesn’t work here any more. He skipped out on us a couple weeks ago without giving us any advance notice.”

I was terrified to ask the next question. “Is there a 12-gauge shotgun in the back room there somewhere? I left it with him so he could use it as a guide while he made the case.”

It seemed as if a thousand years passed while I waited for the employee to go check. My Arid Extra Dry wore off. My mouth felt as if it had been stuffed with cotton. An army of butterflies square-danced in my stomach.

“Sorry, no,” came the answer. “There isn’t any shotgun here. I even checked the storage area.”

Visions of a lawyer granting my husband a divorce flashed through my mind. “Do you know how I can get in touch with the blonde guy?” I asked. “A name and phone number, perhaps?”

“No idea,” he answered. “When I called him to see why he hadn’t shown up for work, I got a recording saying that his number had been disconnected. I’m really sorry I can’t be of more help to you.”

I hung up the phone and debated whether or not I should pack my bags and buy a one-way ticket to Timbuktu before my husband came home from work. How on earth was I going to break the news to him that his precious new shotgun was gone – that I had taken it without his permission and left it with a total stranger without even getting anything in writing?

I started packing.

But as the minutes ticked closer to the time when my husband would be walking in hrough the front door, I decided to be brave and stay and face the music. I frantically rehearsed over and over again what I was going to say to him that wouldn’t cause his blood pressure to rise to stroke levels. I decided it would be best if I used a calm, direct approach. If I remained calm, I reasoned, he would stay calm, too.

Well, so much for my best-laid plans. The minute my husband stepped inside, I burst into tears.

The only word he understood through my sobs was “shotgun.”

“My shotgun?” he asked, his eyes making a quick sweep over me to make sure I hadn’t accidentally blown a hole through some vital organ. “What about it?”

Tearfully, I related the entire story. When I finished, I held my breath and waited.

My husband just stood there staring at me. I couldn’t read his expression, but “smiling” definitely was not a part of it. Finally, when I was on the verge of flinging myself across his feet and begging for mercy, he spoke.

“You left my brand new shotgun with a total stranger and didn’t even get a receipt for it?” he asked in a voice that sounded much too calm.

Smiling weakly, I nodded.

“Do you think that was a smart thing to do?” he asked, still calm.

Sheepishly, I shook my head.

“Then why on earth did you do it?” he asked. I noticed his jaw muscles clenching, as if he were gritting his teeth.

“Because I’m a dumb jerk!” I whined, bursting into fresh tears.

Fortunately, my husband never had been able to bear to see a woman cry (and Ipreviously I had used that fact to my advantage on several occasions), so he immediately mellowed.

“It’s okay,” he said, trying his best to sound convincing. “It’s only a gun. It can be replaced. The important thing is you’re safe.” Then he called the police.

Unfortunately, living in Allenstown and reporting a crime that happened in Manchester, didn’t work. They advised me, because I was the actual victim, to go to the police station in Manchester and file a report. So I headed to the big city.

The woman at the desk in the police station handed me a form to fill out, which I promptly did, then she told me someone would investigate the incident. I left there feeling less than confident that someone would find the shotgun…or would even bother to look for it.

Three days later, I called the police department to ask if they’d heard anything. No one even knew what I was talking about. Finally I was transferred to some detective who said he hadn’t gotten around to working on the case yet.

That did it. My husband’s patience completely ran out.

“I’m going to track down that (insert any profanity here) crook and get my gun back myself!” he snapped. He picked up the phone, dialed the leather store, and somehow “convinced” the manager to give him the thief’s full name and last known address.

“I’m going to Rochester!” my husband then announced after he hung up the phone. “Just because the crook’s phone is disconnected doesn’t mean he’s not still living in the same place. I’ll bet you a dollar I’ll find him there!”

“And what will you do if you DO find him?” I was afraid to ask.

“Get my shotgun back,” he said simply, then grabbed his coat and disappeared out the door.

“Do you really think it’s a wise idea to pay a surprise visit to a guy you KNOW has a shotgun?” I shouted after him.

Three hours later, there still was no sign of my husband. By then, I’d gnawed my fingernails all the way down to my knuckles, and worn a trench in the carpet from pacing. Visions of my husband lying on the ground with more holes in him than a slab of Swiss cheese kept flashing through my mind.

Just as I was getting ready to call out the National Guard, in walked my husband, shotgun in hand. Calmly, he set it down and removed his jacket.

“Well?!” I said. “Are you going to tell me what happened?”

He shrugged. “I went to his apartment in Rochester, but there was no answer. Some guy in the next apartment told me he’d moved out. So I pretended to be a long-lost friend searching for him, and the guy gave me his new address. I headed over there, knocked on the door, asked for the crook by name, and when the guy who answered said, “That’s me,” I simply told him I’d come for my shotgun. He handed it right over to me, no questions asked. I guess my tone must have been pretty persuasive.”

“And I don’t suppose the fact you’re triple his size had anything to do with it?” I said.

“Um, I think I also might have mentioned that the police had been notified,” he said.

So everything turned out fine in the end – except my poor my husband never did get his hand-tooled leather case.

But the entire experience, even after all these years, has caused me to think of Christmas shopping with the same level of excitement and enthusiasm as someone who’s just been informed she needs a colonoscopy.

All I can say is thank goodness for gift cards.

# # #

Sally Breslin is an award-winning humor columnist and the author of “There’s a Tick in my Underwear!” “Heed the Predictor” and “The Common-Sense Approach to Dream Interpretation." Contact her at: sillysally@att.net.