The Present War
Me and my friend Alex (who has made other occasional appearences here) are currently engaged in an escalating present war. It began a few years ago when I gave him a birthday present wrapped in a bit too much sticky tape. He responded by wrapping my next present in yards of duct tape and Aldi catalogues until it looked like a brick of Cocaine.

I, of course, wasn't about to take this lying down. I constructed a wooden box held together with screws, the heads of which I filled with solder to make it extra hard to open.

(It was around this time, by the way, that we devised the 'standard tools' - the only objects you are allowed to use to open your present. They consist of a small hammer, a swiss army knife and a pair of scissors).

Due to him being very ill the next year, he didn't get me a present. I kept up the tradition, though, in a particularly devious way. I acquired a very large scale map of the village where I live (about six miles from his house) and marked off fifty points on it. Eight of the points corresponded to trees with numbers carved into them. He had to start at number one to find the next number, and so on. From memory the sequence was 1,7,23,28,34,35,38,42. He was led to believe his present was buried at the final tree. (This route, of course, involved a certain amount of doubling back. He walked past tree 38 four times without seeing the number I had put on the other side) Tree 42 was in a cemetary and was engraved with the word "MUGGED". When he turned up at my house some four hours after he started, I simply handed over his present.

He decided to go for simple but effective last year. He got a friend of his to weld my present inside a steel cube. Have you ever tried to open a mild steel cube with a hammer? It's bloody impossible. Still, I tried for three weeks before giving in and getting out the cutting discs. Inside I found some stones and a block of wood.

This year I intend to encase his present (a CD entitled "Non-stop Ceildh dance party" in concrete re-inforced with layers of wire mesh. Let's see him get into that in a hurry...
( MatJ LOOK, Wed 23 Sep 2009, 12:42, 2 replies)

Even if the gift inside is rubbish,
I like this. All those hours of "entertainment" trying to open your present is a better gift than something that has had no throught behind it - however well wrapped it might be.
( e.m.m.y. foxtrot uniform charlie kilo india tango, Wed 23 Sep 2009, 14:10, closed)

Use
RC40.....very strong concrete.

C32/40 is ok, but it's no RC40...
( Larry Death Anger Pain Fear Aggression, Wed 23 Sep 2009, 21:20, closed)