Five of the worst Christmas gifts I’ve encountered.
Some may surprise you.
It’s that time of year. Christmas is around the corner. It is the time we think about the best and worst gifts. And the best and worst Christmases we’ve had.
I thought I would take up the challenge of Justjulieandherblog ‘s writers prompt in @TheDigitalJournals of the worst Christmas presents.
I sat and thought about this for a while, and I know over the years I will have had some humdinger rubbish presents that are probably doing the circulation of bad joke gifts from the charity stores for decades to come. I didn’t want my list to be exhaustive, so I have narrowed it down to just five. Two of these were not gifts given to me but to my friends or family.
The reason for these weird and wonderful items to end up in my esteemed final five vary from the ‘they’re just plain awful’ to the ‘seriously, WTF were you thinking?!’ Without further a due, and in no particular order (it was tricky to rank them) here are my five:
1. Fitted sheets.
This may appear as though I am being ungrateful, but I do have my reasons. Had they been given to me by my mum, they would not have made the cut. I would have preferred something better but practical presents from your mum are expected and liveable. However, and it is a big however, said fitted sheets were given to me by my then boyfriend. What does that say about our relationship? Was it some hidden meaning — he likes me in bed, prefers me in bed. Was he trying to hint we should move in together and these would be our fresh start? They weren’t even that nice. Some crappy beige colour.
At the time I also had a particular dislike for fitted sheets. These strange shaped items that no matter which way you hold them you don’t know which is width or which is height. An item of bedding supposedly designed to make bed making easier, faster becomes two hours of struggling, turning, flipping, swearing until you give up and end up with two corners untucked because it’s on the wrong way. Then when it is time to change the sheet and fold it you lose another hour of your life trying to make it flat like the standard sheets and end up with an angry rolled up ball stuffed into the cupboard. I still hate them. It wasn’t the sheets per say but I have a rule that you don’t give practical presents to loved ones (boyfriends, husbands, girlfriends, wives etc). You think about the person, their personality, what they like etc and buy something thoughtful.
Still, I should’ve seen the warning signs, the boyfriend’s dad bought his mum a washing machine the year of fitted-sheet-gate.
2. Earrings.
To some of you this may seem harsh or an odd choice but bear with me.
The earrings in question were quite cute, dainty little faux diamante and sapphire studs. All very sweet and twee. Lovely if you are a sweet, twee kind of person. I really am far from that. These, (many of you may not be so surprised to hear), were from ‘fitted sheet guy’. I clearly was a slow learner back in those days.
It is not the earrings that is the issue. At the time of receiving this gift, I didn’t have my ears pierced. Had no intention of either. Surely a boyfriend would have noticed this huge oversight!
My anger is directed at the clearly panic buying, lack of thought that went into the gift. My angry head assumed he had merely thought as a woman I must like jewellery because “all women like jewellery” and he was persuaded by the pretty saleswoman in the shop that this was a good idea. She also hadn’t stopped to ask if I had my ears pierced or not.
Thinking of sexist presents, the next one is an interesting one…
3. The naked woman shaped nutcracker.
Yes, you read that right.
This was not a gift I had the pleasure of receiving but one my mum (!?!) received. The nutcracker as a practical gift would normally have been a welcome one as every Christmas my mum bought an enormous bag of fresh nuts to eat over the Christmas holidays. So far so good. But why for the love of God create a wooden carved woman splayed out for hungry guests to pop their nuts between her strong nut cracking thighs? This really is a WTF moment. Where do you begin to unpack all the wrongs in this gift?
4. The bicycle poncho.
Onto less controversial gifts. The bicycle poncho is this enormous plastic bag worn from head to pedal. It covers you, your bag, the handlebars, and the bike. Enormously practical. In theory. Until you go to ride your bike inside it. The dilemma begins with which stage to you don this bag. Is it once you are astride your bike where you must then in one dramatic flourish cast this plastic cape about you and your two wheeled steed all while balancing the bike between your thighs in a torrential downpour? Or is it before you get upon the bike? Massive bag engulfing you dragging over the pavement, tripping you up as you lift your leg across the seat pulling the plastic over your nose and mouth causing undue panic resulting in you, poncho, and bike to tumble over into a puddle. Should you after your 4000th attempt succeed in mounting your bike, poncho in place and ride off into the rain, what then? Apart from congratulating yourself, ignoring the guffaws as you cycle past, what happens next is rain forms on the inside of the poncho in the form of your sweat. It is so practical it has prevented any potential air to circulate causing a build-up of heat and sweat to fall back on you. You arrive at your destination wetter than if you had not worn it all.
5. Fake wool seatbelt cover thingy.
This gift is so awful I am not even sure what the correct name for it is. All I know is that my husband and I (I didn’t marry ‘fitted-sheet guy’) received matching pairs one Christmas and from the image on the packaging they were meant to be wrapped around your seatbelts. We assumed they were to prevent seatbelts digging into your neck. Clearly the gift giver had not moved from the 1970’s when seatbelts weren’t adjustable. Another practical gift.
It was a truly awful gift. It was ugly, the fake wool was some strange off white/grey colour, so it appeared as though it used to be white and had been washed with black clothes never to the same again. It was the smell that makes this horrendous. A toxic, eye-watering chemical smell pierced the air destroying all the wonderful spicey Christmassy smells in the house. Touching the gift made your skin crawl. It should have come with its own fire extinguisher.
This is my list of five awful WTF were you thinking Christmas gifts. What are yours?
Merry Christmas! Can’t wait…
