Christmas On The Cheap

Thanks to some time in grad school, and the lucrative career choice of “writer,” there are plenty of years when I haven’t had that much money to spend at the holidays.

I am a crafty person, but even crafts cost money, and sometimes more than money, they take time. During graduate school, I had very little money, and thanks to finals, very little time. I wanted to do something for my friends, but I didn’t have an answer to the question of how.

Eventually, I drove to a store called Happy Price Zee Outlet. Since you probably don’t have one in your neighborhood, let’s just say that it’s kind of like the Dollar Tree and Dollar General had a crack baby. The prices are very low, and the merchandise can be a) defective b) ridiculous c) cheesy d) borderline dangerous or e) all of the above.

If you want a rainbow-themed umbrella to wear on your head, it’s the place for you. It also carries an unnatural number of bobble-head cats. I cannot imagine the patron that shops here for non-gag gifts, but I sense that his or her home/van might resemble that of a hoarder’s.

(As a total aside, I think few people took to the idea of gag gifts like I did as a child. Once my mom told me what they were, I couldn’t believe anyone had ever come up with such a genius concept and that I hadn’t known about it before. It’s your birthday, you open something hideous and have to pretend you like it since you don’t know whether or not it’s a joke? Hilarious. Since I was also on the beginning of the reusing trend, it was not at all uncommon to open a copy of "Decadent Disco” wrapped in an old granola box from me when I was between 11 and 12.)

That year, I went through the Happy Price Zee Outlet, grabbed a bunch of items (oh, that citrus-themed kitchen thermometer was a treasure!), wrapped them and handed them out to my friends with tags that said, To: X, From: Milo (who was my pet at the time), Happy Holidays!

Whenever anyone opened a gift and seemed puzzled, I said, “I don’t know why he picked that out for you. He’s a dog. It’s not like he knows how to shop.”

The joke seemed to go over well. Then again, I’m not the one who got knee pads that year.