Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
This was in 1966, when I was thirteen, and all I wanted for Christmas was white "go-go" boots (a la Nancy Sinatra), and my hopes were WAY up when I went snooping before Christmas and found the boots box that said "White, size 6" (my size).
Imagine my disappointment on Christmas morning when I opened the box and found a pair of white rubber rain boots, the kind that five-year-olds wear. (And we lived in SoCal, no lesx!)
A half block of "government cheese". That generic USDA processed cheese product. I didn't even rate a full block of this stuff the government gives away, I got a half block.
A co-worker gave me a tape of his favorite songs he had put together as a present for me.
This was the guy would didn’t go to our company Christmas party after he learned they videotaped some parts of the festivities and speeches.
One day we were scanning a patient who emptied his pockets before going into the scanner. The patient’s CIA ID card fell out and our co-worker picked it up from the floor. He quickly made up an excuse to leave and disappeared until well after that patient was gone. Our co-worker wasn’t local and didn’t know the ID card was from the Culinary Institute of America.
He also told us how much he liked to go camping in the Catskills on the weekends with a bottle of wine, bedroll and chainsaw. We had questions, but we weren’t sure we wanted to hear the answers, so we didn’t ask.
I thanked him for the gift and threw it away when I got home, I wasn’t even tempted to open it and find out what his favorite songs were. Some things are best unknown and I trust my instincts. It was a relief when he went to work elsewhere after he got his bonus that year.
Mom called me a couple days after thanksgiving to boast about the great deal she got at Macy's, gold bracelets with tiny diamonds for only $16 each. She said she got one for each of her daughters in law.
And that's what she gave me for Christmas. My sister got a Waterford crystal vase. Mom always liked her best.
I had an aunt that was famous for her misguided clothing gifts.
I was 14, full into the 1980s alternative/punkish scene (Think The Cure) with black velvet and hair hanging in my face and safety pins and ripped black tights with buckled boots etc.
This aunt gave me a bright pink sweatshirt with a lavender poodle on the front that was constructed from 1-inch pompoms. It looked like something a 5-year-old might wear... who knows why they even made it in teenage sizes!
Years ago I worked in a large office and they did a secret Santa for Christmas. Somehow word always gets out as to who has whom. The person that had me was someone I despised. When gifts were passed out at the office party I left mine unopened and at the end of the day threw it in the garbage without ever opening it.
You never did find out what that gift was, then, whether the co-worker could be gracious enough to give you a decent gift, or took out his/her aggression by giving you something depraved...? Maybe better not to know, though.....
That happened to me one time at a work Christmas party. The department head took us (about 30 people) to lunch where we exchanged gifts (Secret Santa), everyone opened their gifts, and the coworkers "ooohed and ahhed" over everything. Then I opened my gift, and those "oohs and ahhs" turned to a variety of expressions of disgust, disbelief, and a few nervous giggles..
The "gift" was some sort of a a soap, lotion, body spray, etc. bath set combination, which brand new would have been nice, but the items in the box had obviously been used, were dirty, tops loosened or missing, and items missing. The entire box was dirty as well.
I didn't know how to react, I was embarrassed, but figured the best way was to thank my "Secret Santa", laugh, shrug, and leave the gift at the table when I left. But when we were leaving, someone (I have no idea if it was my Secret Santa or not, the person never owned up to it) ran after me with the "gift"I had left at the table, and informed me with a smirk that I had forgotten it. Well, with that I thanked the person, took the gift and tossed it into the nearest trash can.
Well it wasn't Christmas, it was my birthday, which falls in February. In January my new boyfriend had his birthday. He said he liked to cross country ski and so did I. For his birthday, I paid for a weekend at a rustic mountain lodge near a large cross country ski area, and a romantic dinner at their restaurant. A month later he invited me to "his place" in Reno. It turned out he was renting a room in someone's house, and they were away for the weekend. My "gift" was a small bag from Walmart containing 1 small fishing lure (I don't really fish, and didn't even own a pole), a small bag of cat treats (yes, I had a cat), and a small container of tropical fish food (I also had an aquarium). He said he was sorry, but his car broke down and the only store within walking distance was Walmart. I still don't know how he figured the best thing in Walmart to buy me was a $2 fishing lure.
I almost forgot the award for most wildly inappropriate Christmas gift I ever received was when I was 13 or 14. A teenage son (16 or so) of a friend of the family gave me a gift, I have to assume his mother purchased it, but what in the world she was thinking having her son give it to a barely pubescent girl I'll never know. It was a pale pink, sheer body-suit type blouse. It was extremely low cut and had ruffles to accent the low cut cleavage area. It was so sheer that I didn't even have something appropriate to wear underneath it. I tried it on and wouldn't come out of the bedroom because my bra, and the skin of my stomach, back etc, was completely visible through the sheer fabric.
My mother liked buying junk from QVC which she could watch on her cable service. When the junk arrived she would stack the boxes [un-opened] in a closet. So when birthdays or holidays came around she would pull out those boxes and gift wrap them for each of her children and grandchildren.
Living overseas, we would get these boxes and we had no idea of what she was thinking. They never made any sense to us.
After her funeral, my siblings all met at her house, where we found the closet. We had a big laugh about it, as each of our households had been going through the same sort of thing for years.
Mom called me a couple days after thanksgiving to boast about the great deal she got at Macy's, gold bracelets with tiny diamonds for only $16 each. She said she got one for each of her daughters in law.
And that's what she gave me for Christmas. My sister got a Waterford crystal vase. Mom always liked her best.
Well, sometimes those $16 Macy's diamond bracelets are pretty even if you can't see the diamond (s). There's usually just one, sort of greyish and not very bright, somewhere in a middle setting on the bracelet.
My mother hasn't given us (or me) Christmas gifts, or gifts for any occasion, for that matter, for decades. She's always claimed she didn't know what I liked, didn't have the money, and that we could get what we liked on our own. She always has, however, expected gifts from us on every occasion. She didn't even get us a gift for our wedding, although she and her then husband were invited and came (free food). This was because her husband didn't like my intended, and forbade her to get us a gift.
I got used to it.....
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
