To me the holidays means $$$$$
Buying the turkey dinner, buying new decorations (my current decorations include a light up polar bear and a seal who's head doesn't light up, which means at night my front yard looks like a show on Animal Planet about the natural cycle of life) and of course GIFTS.
There's gifts for my hubby, my daughter, my parents, then there's hubby's parents, hubby's sister, our niece, grandparents (three sets) cousins and their children, oh yeah and friends.
So you know those people in your life, they aren't family, they aren't life long friends. Your relationship with them falls somewhere between, wouldn't want them to get hit by a bus but you're not about to give them your kidney either?
Friendly co-workers who you haven't crossed over to the friendship line. You like chatting with them at work, but you don't want to hang out with them after hours.
Your brother's girlfriend who you know he's going to dump after New Years, but the poor girl doesn't see it coming.
These are people you are sort of indifferent to. You like them alright, but they aren't your favorite human beings on the planet, that's reserved for significant others, children and celebrity crushes.
Here's the thing, how many times have these people given you a gift? Desperately trying to cross the line from bystander to BFF.
They look up at you, doe eyed and adorable, and you have to go and say, "um, yeah, er thanks." Then you rush off to Bath and Body Work and buy some smelly bath stuff. Nothing says, 'I'm sort of indifferent to you' than smelly bath stuff.
Times are tough, budgets are tight, and this is will lead to social awkwardness.
I will buy the gifts for you.
Christmas Gifts for People You Are Indifferent To.
I will give away three mystery gifts.
Mystery gifts may include: a cool book, smell bath stuff and any other stuff that says "I like you, kinda."
You can keep it or give it to someone you sort of care about. Whatever.
How to enter:
- Leave a comment about socially awkward gift giving.
- Extra entries for:
- Being a current follower + 2
- New follower +1
- Referring someone +3 (new person must credit you)
- Tweeting about the contest +1 PER TWEET!!!!
One year my mom gave me only books about religion and cooking. Not sure what the take home message was, but it didn't feel complimentary (I'm not overly into either).
ReplyDeleteI'm an old follower, and will post on my blog, hoping for referrals!
I tend to avoid those types of gifts if I can, but sometimes you have to. You don't need to put me in the drawing.
ReplyDeleteErinn this is a great idea and I'm laughing my butt off because of it!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in middle school, my mother decided she was going to broaden my musical horizons beyond New Kids on the Block. I ended up with a Luther Vandross cassette tape.
I'll tweet you and stick you in my sidebar too.
Tweeted!
ReplyDeleteI hate the "Hey, I got you this!" from someone with whom I wouldn't expect to exchange gifts.
My favorite awkward thank you moment, though, was a coffee mug I got from a co worker after we talked for the whole of December about how my fails and successes of giving up coffee.
Oh. And of course now I think of a better one.
ReplyDeleteThere was one christmas where BF and I gave each other ipods by coincidence, I, a college student at the time, spent way too much money and got him a 4G Nano. He got me this little promo shuffle. I don't even think they make them anymore.
That was slightly awkward.
Hm, I don't know about awkward gifts I've given, but one year at an office Christmas party, my boss got a little penguin that pooped out candy (from someone else). Some people may like that, but she DID NOT and she still talks about it :-)
ReplyDelete+2 old follower
+1 I tweeted http://twitter.com/#!/Sarah_Nicolas/status/6718210086801408
Oh god, the most awkward gift I ever received was from my godmother, who I was not particularly close to.
ReplyDeleteIt was a pink purse with a rhinestone "A" on it for Ariana.
She gave this to me during my goth phase.
It was awkward.
(+1 for being your newest follower??)
Here it goes:
ReplyDeleteI once worked with two women who had the same name. We'll call them Betty to preserve annonymity. I found out Betty was pregnant so I bought her a card to say congrats...only it turned out I gave it to the other Betty...who was just overweight.
I left the job shortly thereafter. Thank god for temp work!
:D