In which complaints and a half-baked moral
Due to my mum's total inability to subsume her own distinctive taste to that of the person she is buying a gift for, I had many rubbish presents growing up. These days, Mnemonic Minor specify in detail something we would like (for me: nice wooly hat and a breadmaker please), although she complains that it 'takes the fun out of it.'

It's a really awful feeling when someone close to you gets you something you don't like. Guilt mixed with disappointment mixed with slight hurt that they don't know you better than that. Last year, my mum got me a beautiful hardback well-presented copy of...Winnie the Pooh. Now. Books are generally my thing, but even as a child, I absolutely hated Winnie the Pooh (whiny, compulsive-over-eating, retarded little shite). I neither owned nor aspired to own any of those books, and besides which there is something wrong with any (semi) grown woman wanting that kind of twee, naff kiddy stuff. And she'd spent about twenty quid (twenty bloody quid!!) on this crappy book. I could have got four books I actually wanted for that, and there was no way of returning it. For some reason, the whole thing made me really upset. I think it was possibly the culmination of years of presents which no thought had been put into, coupled with the waste, coupled with the fact that she got angry with me for not liking it and refused to speak to me all morning.

I realise this might make me sound like a spoiled brat. I don't think that's the case, though. In comparison, I'd searched half the shops in Edinburgh for a specific fountain pen she wanted, hand-made her a necklace, got her a couple of books and made an absolutely enormous stained-glass panel that took about a month of evenings to create. I'd been determined I wasn't going to let the fact I was on minimum wage affect what I could give my family. Ach, I don't know. It's just that if you're worrying/panicking about what to get your nearest and dearest for Christmas, then just listen to them, and for my money anyway, it really, really is the thought that counts.
(jennymnemonic, Fri 27 Nov 2009, 11:42, 2 replies)

I know what you mean
I too have had the thoughtless gift problem. It is the thought that counts, you can't put a price on consideration.
(Free pens 100, 101, 102 is still counting on, Fri 27 Nov 2009, 12:09, closed)

The thought may count
But for some people the thought was 'I simply couldn't be bothered to spare so much as a second considering what you actually like', which doesn't count for much in my book.
(louveciennes , Volvospotter, Sat 28 Nov 2009, 16:21, closed)