Image from Amor Y Resistencia!
It’s that time again, when custom dictates you give friends and families “gifts” comprised of trinkets you go out and purchase, but this year you can’t even figure out how the hell you’re gonna make the rent on the first of the month, so what is to be done? You could hit the 99¢ store and try to scrounge up the best looking items that DON’T look like they came from the 99, but who are you kidding? Economists and Politicians keep repeating the mantra that we must buy-buy-buy to save the economy but that’s getting a bit boring. Besides, they messed things up anyways, let them fix it. They’re already tapping into our wallets for those stupid bailouts of banks and car companies but I don’t think we should help them any further. Thus I give you the practical suggestion for saving lots of money this season: Don’t buy anyone nothing! (Sticklers for grammar can substitute that last word with “anything”.)
Why not rethink the concept of the gift? It doesn’t mean much anyways when you give or get random STUFF at the end of the year, maybe save your gift and turn it into a nice surprise in May? Skip the credit card debt-spree and do something corny but nice for your pals, like a nice homemade meal or some help with the garden. Besides, if all they want is some plastic crap from you then maybe they shouldn’t be your friends or family. You might have to make an exception for your significant other or somebody else but the idea is to feel free to NOT give things this year. Run with it.
Man, that sure was a crappy post. But I really just wanted a reason to share that picture above with you! Enjoy!
I for one have been living and practicing exactly what you’re writing about. I’m only getting things for a select few and my sisters. Even at that all of the things I’m getting are hand made, unique and from artist struggling to make it this year too !!! Nothing says how much you care like a hand made card or handmade jewelry.
Awesome image!
I only buy gifts for my nieces and nephews (they are all under 10). But always get together with my family and my wife’s family. We all share that. There were times that both her family and my family would go into a pool for the super lotto or buy each other a scratcher ticket. We always celebrate Christmas Eve with lots of food and obviously, the most important thing, “la familia unida”.
I wish more people would put less emphasis on buying gifts, especially during these hard economic times. I know it will be painful to explain to their kids, but the older kids and adults should understand that it is rough out there to earn your money. I’ve heard a couple of people talk about unemployment rates hitting the 20% range by the end next year. I’m not too thrilled about the prospects of the economy–having 1 out 5 people not working is not good. Families are losing their houses not only because they got a bad loan, but because they lost their job and can’t sell the house or pay the mortgage. I’ve noticed more and more people at the corners where day laborers congregate. To top it off, there’s less construction jobs going around — what will be the alternative for the unemployed person? I hope they live by the old saying ¡pobre, pero honrado!
i, for one, have learned from our corporate overlords of finance, el chavo, and you do not go far enough, sir. rather than GIVE, we must TAKE. simply not giving only stymies the outgoing cash in the all-important personal bottom-line by which the creator will judge us. actively taking replenishes the incoming. you’ll be killing one stone with two birds.
harsh, you say? hardly. as we all know, no one needs plastic crap, so why not offer to TAKE it from everyone you know. you’ll be doing them a service and you’ll meet lots of new friends in line at the recycling center.
remember, the most important lesson the 80s taught us: he who dies with the most stuff wins.
wait, or was it adhering to “he who dies with the most stuff wins” in the 80s leads to a recession in 1990? or was it that there would be even longer term effects causing la crisis 20 years later? i never was very good at history.
I am giving gifts this year but none to children (they get enough shit from everyone else and it’s not like they’ll remember anyways!) and all my gifts are edible cuz everyone needs to eat. Not fancy edible like those little weeners and spreadable cheez baskets, but some homemade bread and cans and jars of food all purchased at the Von’s 50 percent off going out of business sale!!
if you look closely, u can see santa’s face in the fire.
Santa? Don’t you mean Satanas???
mmmm weeneers and cheese mmmmmm
jk
give tamales. you can unwrap them. don’t tell em what kind they are and there you have the surprise factor.
ahh, ur right, it is satan, i guess santa kind of looks like satan.