It’s that time of year again and I’m losing hair trying to think of what to get Jo for Christmas, which would be fine if I had a little more spare to lose! It’s not like the hair I’m losing is falling out of my nose or off my back is it?
No way, any stray hair that shouldn’t be there is happily fixed on solid and is staying whilst gradually becoming grey. The hair that my fretting is killing off is of course from the minimal locks that have until now clung onto my head. The only consolation from this depilation is that it will all be their own fault, when it’s all gone and my wife is having to walk around town being seen married to a baldy and my kids are hiding their heads in shame at the school gates when my shiny bowling ball head homes into view. I shall revel in pointing out that I told them so, the boys will finally accept that perhaps they could have behaved a little better and not asked for so much; Jo will hang her head in regret at all the years of nagging and being damned hard to buy a Christmas present for!
In fact, Jo is not hard to buy a present for at all as I know exactly what she would like. The problem is that I bought her that last year, and the year before I think. I was determined that this year would be different, this year I would not be hitting the Clinique counter. Jo does love the body butter though and really appreciates a bit of moisturising cream. My wife can get excited about bubble bath in a way that absolutely baffles me. Put a whole set in front of Jo so she can match her smells (bubble bath, moisturizer, deodorant & perfume) and she will smile in a way that most normal people would if told they had won the lottery. The next hour would see her locked in the bathroom with the candles lit (what is all that about?) and when she comes out you still have another hour before she will even start getting dressed; no body knows what exactly it is a woman does after a bath that takes so long but I’ve successfully remained married for 11 years by not loitering about to find out and have no desire to start asking now.
I’ve tried other gifts of course; all failed and left the air cold. We all know about the Green Party’s policy about outlawing husbands from buying Lingerie. They want it made illegal for unescorted married men to enter a lingerie department unless they can prove that they are buying it for a mistress. Apparently 30% of the electricity used in China is used up making sexy bras and pants that will only ever see the back of a wife’s underwear drawer, the materials sourced to make these items are thankfully minimal due to the husband’s natural assumption that a woman prefers to have as little material as possible used on the pants. If the unwanted, never to be worn lingerie that was received by British wives on Christmas day were to be laid out end to end they would allegedly stretch from Lands End to John O’Groats and back three times and use up a whole squared meter of silk!
Once I tried getting her something that I thought was really good, I sourced her a top of the range (at the time) 1Gb USB flash drive; it was really fast and sleek looking and could read and write at about 6X faster speeds than it’s peers. I was really excited about this present but you should have seen her face, I thought I’d mistakenly asked her if she fancied trying swinging from the look of disgust on her face! I couldn’t understand it, I knew full well she was fed of having to take our laptop to work so that she could keep files up to date and I’d given her a fantastic solution to this issue – what was the problem?
Shoes, jumpers, tops and trousers – forget it! Over the years I’ve tried it all. In the early years I tried buying her things that I thought I’d like to see her in. MEN - NEVER EVER DO THIS! With experience I now try and watch careful while we are out at the things she looks at or tries on but even this doesn’t work because if she tried it on and liked it she would have bought it anyway! Then I try and listen to hints which is a sure fire way of cocking it up because there’s bound to be at least three different knee length black and white tops in next with a square neckline and only one of them is right. The Charity shop near us has benefitted quite well from clothing of one form or another that Jo has dutifully worn once whilst out with me in January before feeding it into to Clothing bank whilst I’m not looking. The rest have just gone straight back and been swapped for something that looks almost identical to me but is apparently correctly fitted and totally different colours.
So here I am again desperately trying to avoid the Clinique counter at Boots and instead determined to go it alone and get her something that is as good as she deserves but am failing badly. Apart from lotions, potions, make up brushes and candles what on Earth can you buy a woman and have at least a 1 in 5 shot at getting it right? I think I’ll have a browse on Amazon and think about it, they have some quality ‘all in one’ remote controls that work your T.V. DVD and anything else all from one control that I’m fairly certain she will like. Wait a minute what was that thing I saw in the Innovations catalogue? USB powered foot warmer? Now we are talking…
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