A gift voucher for an enema. No. Just no. It sends one of two messages; either it tells me what I’m full of or the giver would like to see someone ram a hose up … well you get the idea. Neither conveys the joy and spirit of Christmas although, given the state of some people’s extended family relationships, it might be an expression of honest sentiment.
Ten litres of engine oil. No matter what the auto-shop ad says, this is not an ideal Christmas gift for dad. Any woman given a gift basket of cleaning products for Christmas would be excused homicide in a court of law. Just because I’m male and have procreated, does not mean that I love cars. I pay a guy to sort them out for me because they are slimy, smelly, incomprehensible, diabolical machines. Even if I did love cars, giving a car lover engine oil would be like buying a cook a 20kg gift bag of plain flour.
Executive toys. For the real-deal executive, executive toys are called interns. For the rest of us that don’t have the money, power or moral turpitude to treat junior staff as sexual playthings, giving us that weird pin thing that holds an impression of your hand for as long as you hold your hand in it is just as likely to get us fired as promoted. Think this through. I’m sitting at my desk with my hand jammed in a black box full of pins. The boss comes along and says, “You’re my man. You have the executive toys, you must have the wherewithal for the top job.” In which reality is that going to happen? It’s more likely to turn into a time-management issue at my next performance review or a question asked when I’m sent for a compulsory psych evaluation.
Anything made from marzipan. Marzipan is wrong, at all times and in all places. Shaping it into fruit and painting it does not help.
Christmas biscuit assortments. Used as the standby present – in case someone turns up with an unexpected gift – they are truly awful; characterised by over-baked shortbread coated with more sugar than my son puts on his Weet-Bix. I wouldn’t buy them for myself on special at two for $3 in normal time. In the special pocket reality inhabited by the festive season, they come in piles of three, lovingly encased in cup-cake wrappers and tastefully arranged in a tin featuring a Dickensian Christmas scene painted by someone whose imagination has been informed by old Disney films and a $2.50 an hour pay cheque.
Motor vehicles. The self-talk that allows us to gain weight and interest bearing debt because “hey, it’s Christmas” is not going to provide enough justification to pop into the dealer and purchase a $35,000 automobile just in time for the big day. If it is that strong for you, then I will organise a personal visit from David Koch who can patronise you rigid about how to manage your money until the urge goes away. For the rest of us, it takes but thirty seconds of rational thought to remember that, if we are truly in need of a new car, there will be a New Year car sale with runout deals across the entire range (not unlike the end of financial year sale with runout deals across the entire range or the Mad May sale with …). I don’t buy for one minute the idea that a new sedan is going to give me time over Christmas to drive mysteriously empty and well paved mountain roads, cornering like James Bond just before the first sex scene, nor do I believe that a new SUV for the hols will make my kids preternaturally quiet and happy to be sitting in the back of the car for 8 hours at a time in the middle of the Australian summer. Try again.
Cultural notes: The financial year in Australia ends in June, not in December as in some other countries. David Koch is a morning TV presenter and syndicated columnist who writes on personal finance management offering such gems as “don’t buy lunch every day” and “too much takeaway coffee will bankrupt you”. Weet-Bix is a breakfast cereal made from flakes of wheat cereal pressed into bars about 10cm long, 4cm wide and 2cm thick. They are the staple of many families’ breakfast but are very dull to eat without sugar.
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