I'm First! Holiday Shopping Completed!

Having snatched up a brace of traffic signs (Watch for Falling Rock, Yield)  for my Veteran friends, I'm turning the page on this years' gift giving and thinking about what to gift for next year.

"Happy Holidays," I shouted to all as I made my final rounds of Veteran's Day shopping. 

There's red everywhere but people seem a little slow this  year getting into the Veteran's/Thanksgiving/Christmas/Chanukuah/Boxing Day (Canadian)/Kwanza/ Revolution Day(Mexico)/ New Year's Eve and Day spirit.

I didn't get much response.  Maybe they still have some shopping to do.

What's with you people?

In order to be efficient, I work backwards.

I start with New Year's Day gifts.  Every year I have made T-shirts embazoned "Get Over Your 2011 Hangover, Dude." My buddies have come to expect it and they always tell me last year's shirts (the  only change is the date) got so worn they had to throw it out.

Then it's on to Boxing Day (December 26) where I shower my Canadian friends with, what else, boxing gloves. Traditionally, we go a few rounds and I leave bloody, but not bowed.

The Christmas/Chanukuah Doubledown.

This  is my one failing.  I never know what to get for these holidays.  Pens?  Ink blotters? Air Filters?

So I skip it. 

Nobody bothers with these days anyway. Holiday gift-giving seems to be on the downswing, especially for Christmas.  I predict the Veteran's Day/Revolution Day shopping corridor  will surpass Christmas/Chanukuah as the the biggest shopping time of the year.  If Vegas had odds on it, I'd bet on it.

I give thanks to my Thanksgiving friends by sending them a a dozen frozen turkey tails in the hopes that they'll pardon a turkey and cook tail instead (See Turkey Tails Stir Fry).

There's nothing more exciting than shipping for Revolution Day gifts for my friends south and north of the border. I get them bottled water and regale them with Montezuma's Revenge tales of bathroom calamities the last time I visited.  The joke's on me. I think.

Finally, Veteran's Day is here.  I'm done!