Looking for the perfect Christmas gift that combines elegance and a touch of indulgence? Look no further than alcohol gift sets, the ideal present for those who appreciate a well-crafted libation. This holiday season, consider elevating your gift-giving game by surprising your loved ones with thoughtfully curated sets that cater to their taste preferences.
Continue reading “Give Someone a Little Tipple this Christmas!”
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If you’ve read my blog before, you may have seen this, where I slammed the internet for being full of weirdos and a generally dodgy place to be sometimes. And I still maintain that, if used in the wrong way, the internet can be dangerous, especially to those who are still beautifully innocent and unencumbered with the shittier aspects of humanity. But this past couple of weeks, I have gained a little bit of context and it’s reinstilled my faith in Al Gore’s greatest invention.
Unless you’ve been living in a subterranean bunker (or, say, another country…) you’ll be aware that the UK received a rather unseasonable coating of the white stuff which has, more or less, brought the country to a standstill. This couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time, as we’re all deep into the consumer frenzy that is the build up to christmas. This, however, has not been a problem for me. I have managed to do all of my christmas shopping on the internet (save for a couple of things that I got at Peacocks, my sister works there and gave me a voucher for 40% off!). I considered venturing out to buy a christmas tree, but with Amazon selling a 6ft tree, at only £9.99, reduced from £32.50, leaving the house seemed a unneccesary embuggerance!
I’m not one of those people who does well with the christmas shopping experience. I hate queueing., and hate people who cut queues even more. I hate the crowded shops, I hate the way the shops think it’s a great idea to cram as much shit down one aisle as possible, making it impossible to navigate with a pushchair, and a toddler who just loves to grab things off of the shelves as we’re walking by. I hate the rudeness that christmas brings out in people too. If I’ve held open one door, only for people to waltz through without saying thank you, I’ve held open half a million. And I’m not the type to take it lying down, so I generally spend my day shouting “YOU’RE WELCOME!” after rude arseholes who think a woman with a buggy is just an elaborate doorstop.
So this year, the internet has been an utter godsend. For the past 4 years, we’ve sworn that we’ll start our shopping early and do it all on the ‘net, and just never quite got ourselves organised enough to actually do it. But this year, I finally understand why we’ve been promising to do it all this time! The only thing I need to actually leave the house for is tinsel and baubles, and that’s only because I fully intend to go to the Pound Shop to get them as I begrudge spending lots of money on what is effectively shredded shiny paper and painted lightbulbs. Also, there’s no way in hell I’m going to pay for delivery! We’re even planning to do our food shopping online, although judging by the shit that Tesco have been pulling lately, we’ll be lucky if even half of it arrives.
So there you go, people, that’s my guide to stress-reduced Christmas. Although, I just know my luck, it’ll all go really smoothly, until I get to town and find that there are NO tree decorations left in any shop, except the really expensive designer ones. In which case, we’ll be making our own.
(Note to self, remember to save all of the cardboard tubes from toilet roll, in case of emergency tree-fairy construction)
Photo by Karsten Winegeart on Unsplash
This year, my one Christmas wish is to be able to find Husband a really awesome present. Budget restraints rule out a Porsche/holiday/Alienware gaming PC, so I have to be a little bit more inventive with what I buy.
The trouble is, Husband is bloody brilliant at buying me gifts. Gifts from the last few Christmas’ and birthdays include a Tassimo machine, a camera, an iPod Classic and dock and a mobile phone, amongst other things and if you know me, you’ll know these are all really great gifts for me. And these are just the big gifts, he always manages to surprise me with really thoughtful little gifts, out of the blue, too. At least three times a year, I’ll answer the doorbell to find a man with a huge bouquet of flowers, just because Husband wants to tell me that he loves and appreciates me. When I was in hospital, the day after having Sausage, which also happened to be our wedding anniversary, he turned up with a foot long Subway and every single book written by Stephen Fry.
I suppose the reason that Husband is so good at buying me gifts is that he knows me so well, coupled with the fact that he has an amazing memory, so he remembers every time I say “Wow, I really want a ….”, and manages to drag the information from the recesses of his brain at crucial times to surprise me. The trouble is, I have a shit memory, and am fairly self-involved, which means when Husband says “I really want a …” my brain goes “Ooh, yeah, that reminds me, I want one of these…”, and come holiday-season, I’m screwed.
The other problem I have is that I take things too far. Earlier in the year, Husband mentioned that he’d like a pad to sketch on. So I went on the internet and found a handmade, leather-bound journal, with organic unprocessed paper and a brass padlock. Now, I’m sure, with hindsight, that he just meant a run-of-the-mill pad of plain white sketching paper, but I saw an opportunity for an awesome gift and I ran with it. Only it’s not an awesome gift, is it? It would probably just sit there, looking all precious and too nice to tarnish with actual sketches.
I just don’t have the gift for buying gifts. I’m gift-impaired.
I know for a fact that Husband has bought me two Christmas presents already. And I just know that they’re going to be awesome and perfect, and something that I desperately want and don’t even remember mentioning to him. Which means that the pressure is on. I need to find him the perfect present, so that I deserve all the “wonderful wife” bouquets that I know he will buy me next year.
To the drawing board….or the Liverpool FC shop!
If you’ve read my blog before, you’ll know that Husband has some sleep issues which mean that often, he is awake while the rest of the household is asleep. We’re both avid users of StumbleUpon, which means that I often wake up with a dozen emails from him, little things that he’s read that he thinks I’ll find interesting. And I love it, it’s one of my favourite things as I know that he’s been thinking of me, plus it gives us lots to talk about and debate upon. He’ll send me things which are so random, so totally me that it gives me a warm feeling to think that he really gets me, you know?
Until yesterday.
Continue reading “Stuck in my Ways?”