{"id":1314,"date":"2006-10-27T14:43:00","date_gmt":"2006-10-27T18:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/archives\/1314"},"modified":"2006-10-27T14:43:00","modified_gmt":"2006-10-27T18:43:00","slug":"candyfluenza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/archives\/1314","title":{"rendered":"Candyfluenza"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have eaten enough Reese’s peanut butter cups today to sink a battleship. Seriously, I may die from excessive blood sugar at any moment. <\/p>\n

On the bright side, this has given me reason to reflect on how I can best “say goodbye” to my loved ones, by showering them with gifts that will demonstrate how much they mean to me. <\/p>\n

Fortunately, the perfect solution for gift giving has been delivered to my door, every week for a few months now. See, back in January, Justin bought this very expensive alarm clock for his friend Glenda’s birthday out of the Hammacher Schlemmer catalogue<\/a>. Hammacher Schlemmer is a store that specializes in offering an astonishing array of objects for sale to people with WAY too much money and NO clue what to spend it on. <\/p>\n

For example, a $9000US life-sized replica of the fortune-telling machine, ‘Zoltar’ from the Tom Hanks movie, ‘Big’:
\n<\/p>\n

As a result, our house has been given priority placement on the “schmuck” mailing list for every catalogue company within a thousand miles that markets absolute schlock. My personal favorite of the million magazines we are privy to every week is called “Casual Living”, which specializes in retailing some of the tackiest, cheapest, most useless crap in the known universe. <\/p>\n

So, I present to a select group of my friends list, the selections I have whimsically chosen for them from the online version of “Casual Living”‘s catalogue of dubious delights:<\/p>\n

For – Opera. It’s an expensive lifestyle. Constant travel, costly glamour shots, the upkeep of your personal appearance, endless expensive coachings… but no longer! Casual Living can provide you with singing coach UNLIMITED<\/a>, (screw those “limited” HUMAN coaches) and a stand-out-from-the-crowd performer’s hat<\/a> that virtually GUARANTEES you’ll be standing on the stage at LaScala in NO TIME FLAT. Don’t hate me. I really want to see you in that hat. If you start feeling resentful, just be glad you didn’t get chosen to wear this<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For – I know how much you enjoy a fine meal. What could be finer?<\/a><\/p>\n

For – After your birthday dinner, I think I’ll get you and Paul a matching pair of these handy utensils<\/a>. No more public humiliation in ethnic restaurants for you!<\/p>\n

For – When you come visit me for Christmas, you’d better<\/i> be wearing these sweet, stylin’ shoes<\/a>. I insist that you pair them with this equally fashionable top<\/a>, and this distinctive, jaunty chapeau<\/a>. (Please don’t hate me for picturing you in this outfit and laughing a lot.)<\/p>\n

For – You love lamp<\/a>. This one is “a glimpse of paradise… with rope accents”. Oh, and maybe a lovely candle set<\/a> to go with it, which would really mess with our minds on DLLC nights. “No! Melly! Don’t eat the wax cheese!”<\/p>\n

For – I just know your kitties would love you more if you would buy them a THIRTEEN DOLLAR PAPER BAG<\/a> to play with. Don’t worry, the money is totally worth it. They guarantee the bag makes crinkly sounds. Totally worth it!<\/i><\/p>\n

For – Because who DOESN’T want a full head of hair?<\/a><\/p>\n

For – Looking at these kind of makes me want to vomit, but I think your hubby would LOVE for you to have them, so you could help out around the house more with the reno.<\/a> On the other hand, career-wise, this might be better suited to your needs.<\/a><\/p>\n

For – No, seriously, even though they are impossibly tacky, you might enjoy these.<\/a> …or, you might like this better<\/a>… and also maybe these<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For – I am so, so sorry that I saw this and thought of you<\/a>. So sorry. <\/p>\n

For – Dude, I so want to do this to your Honda<\/a>. No, really, please? Also totally up your alley, a better way to get your beans<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And for (’cause I know your birthday’s coming up on Monday, honey) – This hat and matching tennis shoe set<\/a> must be the worst\/best thing in the whole damn catalogue.<\/p>\n

The rest of you will have to wait for gifties until further “inspiration” strikes me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have eaten enough Reese’s peanut butter cups today to sink a battleship. Seriously, I may die from excessive blood sugar at any moment. On the bright side, this has given me reason to reflect on how I can best “say goodbye” to my loved ones, by showering them with gifts that will demonstrate how […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-consciousness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1314"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1314\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pipesdreams.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}