Grab your seats and get a load of these lousy gifts

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Tuesday, December 24, 2002

We asked our readers to share their stories of good presents gone bad, and all we can say is: Sometimes a lump of coal looks pretty good.

Without any further ado, let's unwrap some gifts that make good stories, if nothing else:

When it comes to gifts going bad, I'm pretty sure I win the mother of all prizes. It all starts early in my childhood when my brother and I would wake up around 7 on Christmas morning just waiting for my mom to get up so we could open our presents. Without fail, we would have to wait for our grandmother to come over before we could tear into that wrapping paper. Mom would call and tell her to get over to our house no later than 8:30. But seeing as how my grandmother was afflicted with a terminally late gene, she would show up at noon and then proceed to lock herself in the back bedroom and wrap presents for another hour so. This happened every year until I moved out of the house.

When I was 10 years old, I got a "new swimsuit" from my grandmother. It was the ugliest thing, bright pink, blue and green flowers on it and I thought it was a tennis dress because it had the longest skirt and the pointiest bra I had ever seen in it. Needless to say, I never wore it. One year I gave my grandmother a complete makeup ensemble only to get it back the next year. Another year I got a toaster, complete with crumbs. Then I got a salad spinner, dirty and broken. But the most award-winning Christmas present of all was the year all of the grandchildren got padded toilet seats (different colors for each grandchild). The funny thing was most of the grandkids still lived at home, but we each had a padded toilet seat to call our own. Since I was living on my own at that point, and in desperate need of home decor, I ended up hanging mine on the wall with a picture of you know who underneath it. Yes, it finally got to the point where I didn't even bother opening the presents from her, I just took them straight to the dumpster.

-- Kathryn Rich

One year, when my younger brother had no money, he gave everyone in the family an individually wrapped can of Fresca. That was it. No explanations. I thought it was a joke, but he was serious.

-- Heather Rutledge

I was in ninth grade and it was the Christmas after the Summer of Love. The one gift I asked for was the Woodstock album. Under the tree was a present! It was shaped like the Woodstock album! It felt like the Woodstock album! On Christmas morning I opened it with great anticipation. . . . It wasn't the Woodstock album, it was the COWSILLS! (I think my parents saw the naked people on the cover of Woodstock and opted for something more parent-friendly.)

-- Criss East

Once my sister got me a can of Pringles. Not a special holiday can, not a fancy can, a can of Pringles like any can of Pringles you can get from the grocery store. She also gave me a box of apple-flavored candy canes that you can get from the grocery store during Christmastime . . . for $1 a box.

My father got me the complete works of William Shakespeare. I was 7 at the time. Another Christmas, Dad gave me a diet book, an etiquette book and a book on how to attract men with a card that said "with the hope you'll grow into a proper young lady." I was 24.

I worked for the same woman for four years and every Christmas she would put together baskets of gourmet foodstuffs for us. When she quit she was replaced by a man I'll call "Ted." Somebody must have informed Ted of what she used to do. He certainly got the idea if not the point. Two days before Christmas he brought in a box of Swiss Miss Cocoa and left it on the file cabinet. A year later only two envelopes were missing.

-- Cameron Rose

Our family of two small girls plus mom and dad received a family gift from my mother-in-law. The package was carefully wrapped and addressed to the Orton Family. Who should get to open the gift for all of us? Finally, one of the girls began the ripping and tearing process with all of us cheering and expectant. Boy, surprise, the letdown, how odd and inappropriate, a home electrolysis kit! After the initial discomfiture, we all laughed and now look forward to being the one who gets this "prize" hidden as always in a lovely disguise.

I would like to mention that she followed this gift with two nasal-hair clippers two or three years apart. Maybe we just didn't get the hint.

These have never engendered the oddball warm spot in our hearts of the home electrolysis kit.

-- Criss Orton, Seattle

Last year, my 4-year-old daughter received a porcelain poodle. This gift was from a friend of her grandmother's and we believe that it came from her apartment. It is about a foot long and about 7 inches tall. It is cream-colored with a little orange overlay, has dust and grime on it (obviously from years on a shelf) and at the base it looks as if it was made in 1972. Now, this friend also goes to garage sales so we could be mistaken as to where it came from. I would also like to note that this friend is 45 and has a 15-year-old. We couldn't believe that someone that age with a child themselves would think it appropriate to give such a gift to a 4-year-old, especially a dirty one. We laughed a lot about it and even made sure that we took fun photos of it while we opened the rest of our presents.

-- Wendy Robinson

I came home from a day of running chores at the end of November a few years ago. I walked into the living room and found a very large box wrapped in cheap wrapping paper with a small tinsel bow in one of the corners. I asked my husband, "What is this?" He answered, "It is a surprise."

I was excited. He had never in all our 16 years ever bought me a Christmas gift. The box sat in the living room for two weeks and then it was moved to the family room where it waited until Christmas Eve, the chosen time for us to open our presents because on Christmas Day we were going to visit our grandchildren.

I knocked myself out with a finer than fine dinner that included some fancy wine. I had purchased lots of really thoughtful gifts for my husband and while there was only one gift under the tree for me that was cool because my gift was so BIG. We ate, enjoyed listening to a few carols and then moved in to open the gifts.

My husband went first, second, third . . . ripping and tearing and ahh-ing through his stack. I waited patiently until he was done before I removed any of the wrapping on my box. I savored the moment and asked a few times, "What is in here?' Each time he answered, "It is a surprise."

I was a surprise all right . . . down at the bottom of that big old box was a box of red wine. When I yelled, "What the hell is this?" He looked startled and then his eyes got that look like they do when he is in deep doo-doo. He started talking real fast telling me that my good friend who had left for a road trip that would keep her away through the holidays had dropped it off before she left town. Like this was going to save him!! He hadn't gotten me anything!!!!

At three in the morning he was begging me to please, please stop yelling. His eyes were rimmed in red and his nose was dribbling from snuffles when it dawned on me that I had been yelling since 10 p.m. I had 16 years' worth of yelling to do.

This year, 10 years later, as I have every year since the "wine in the box," I will receive a perfect gift.

Whenever we are in a group and they start telling holiday stories I cap them all by telling about my "wine in a box," and as for my dear friend who actually gave me the wine, it is also her favorite story.

-- Etta Hunter

-- Anonymous, December 25, 2002


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