enough paper

Oh my how the forgottens have changed. There is a thick layer of permanent snow covering every open inch of ground and a thick fog bank has obscured the view of the peaks in the distance. You can sense the joy of winter on it's first official day here in the forgottens and everyone that can is up enjoying their slopes, if only for a few hours. It's not as cold here as it has been for the past few weeks, but the sentiment of winter remains. Cocoa is good, dry gloves are good. Snot dripping from you cold nose is bad. That's winter time and the shortest day of the year is even shorter with the heavy fog blocking out the distant sun. From here on out, each day will be a bit longer, a bit brighter and a bit more tolerable on the skin. Less snot, more tee shirts.

Around town, the major buzz is all the last minute this-or-that shopping and it's weird to watch. It's nice to know that some of these people finally found some extra money and it's weird to see people that rarely buy things, go at it with a fury. The ski hill has been open for three weeks and there is money in everyone's pockets around here and they are trying to spend it all before the holiday arrives. Funny, but none of them really have smiles on their faces. They are running around, being generous, and none of them look happy about it. In my mind, the only reason I can see for feeling this way is that ONE - They are buying presents for people they don't like and can't seem to rationalize the expenditure. Or TWO - they are concerned about how they are going to wrap the presents they purchased. Funny how those two issues can carry weight in your mind.

At my third grade Christmas party, a young kid that never really made a mark on my memory for anything in particular, brought to school his entry into the open gift Christmas party pool. The other children had brought well wrapped boxes or neatly packaged items that were indistinguishable upon inspection, but this young boy had gotten it all wrong and had just grabbed his dart board off the wall and casually wrapped it up with paper and two full rolls of tape. The package was round, flat and was ripping at all the awkward corners. He didn't seem to care whether or not you could tell what it was, it was obvious what it was and it was made even more apparent by the wire mesh on the dart board poking through the paper, which he used to "hang" his present on the wall with. He hadn't tried to disguise a thing.

During the lottery to see which kid got to go first, second and so on, he drew the fifth place spot and actually took back his own gift in a move that shocked us all. That is not how it is supposed to happen and I'm sure there was some kid that was just dying to get a hold of that dart board. Especially if it was the one that had the baseball-dart game on the back side. Apparently this kid had been visited by the Gods, who had told him to sacrifice his most precious possession and if he did he would be rewarded. So I guess he took that dart board, wrapped it up in the disgusting way that he did so no one would take it and when he saw his chance, he brought his prize possession back home. His reward... Unwrapping the tape to find that his old dart board was still his. I'm sure he was incredibly blissful that night and the Gods was a bit put out. I don't remember that kid's name or what happened to him. Perhaps the Gods smot him for his act of insolence.

Wrapping presents isn't easy and I would say that it borders on an artform. The delicate nature of the paper, the cutting of straight lines, the proper application of tape in the right places - it's all very difficult. You have to be careful not to cut the paper to short and ruin the dimensions. Thus leaving an open window for the person to see inside the wrapping and figure out what it is. You have to make sure you don't leave too much paper, which will leave a wad of paper at the end that is impossible to tape down. I know some people that know how to match up the paper folds so that you don't ruin the pattern in the paper, that's a true talent. You could almost say that the perfect wrapping IS the gift. Which could explain why so many women delicately unwrap presents. Either they are studying to see how it was done or they want to keep the paper as the gift.

For the cheaters and the less talented they have created gift bags. Decorative bags made out of wrapping paper that only require that you place your item inside them and then cover them with tissue paper. It's the most unexciting method of gift opening, but it does make it handy to take that present and throw it away later if you don't like it.

Of course, if you're completely inept you can just give the present to someone without wrapping it at all. This is never exciting. When someone gives someone a car, they have a bow put on it because.. People like to open things! I have never given anyone a car and I'm not sure that the bow is really what is exciting them and making them jump up and down in the bitter cold, but it might be.

I'm sure many of you have gifts to buy and things to arrange and I know that many of you have family issues to address so through the holiday I will understand if your emails are a bit more tinged with rage than normal.

Give me shit!