Xmastime Is Here, By Golly!

Hi Xmas lovers;

As you all know, Sears and K-Mart are already rolling out the Xmas goods in hopes that the ready availability of cheap consumer trinkets and cold-weather gear will entice the more enthusiastic seasonal shoppers among us to come a-courtin'.

As you might guess, I will not be among them.

However, this pathetic act of commercial desperation has me thinking about the Xmas season to come, and I'm again beset by the three basic problems of gift-giving as we know it here in Amerika:

(1) We rarely know what the other person wants.
(2) Gift-giving often lacks sincerity.
(3) The gifts are often forgotten almost immediately.

So with that in mind I have a new plan for this upcoming yuletide season:

This year, I'm buying everyone in my family a tattoo. Think about it. It's trendy, it's esthetic, it's relatively inexpensive and it's permanent.

Plus, there's no gift-wrapping and I don't have to shop. This saves on paper and gasoline, so the idea is friendly to the environment, too.

Of course, once you accumulate enough tattoos your corpse will be considered toxic waste so get used to the idea of spending eternity stored next to the nukes deep in the bowels of Yucca Mountain.

But I digress.

For the sake of simplicity I've limited the choice to the following six designs:

(1) Snake
(2) Palin/Jindal 2012
(3) Hate/Love (knuckles only)
(4) Barbed wire
(5) Swastika
(6) UPC code
(7) Heart with either "Mom" or "Wow" in it depending upon level of affection for parent, video game and /or palindromes.

(As for the under-18 crowd I'll have plenty of temporary tattoos, candy cigarettes and near-absinthe so that they don't feel left out.)

So for the next five months I've instructed my kith and kin to begin cogitating on the tattoo of their dreams. On the weekend prior to Xmas, when our extended family traditionally gathers, and immediately following the final gun at the new and improved Cowboys Stadium, we'll all caravan down to the warehouse district and seek the most sanitary and least disreputable parlour we can find.

Happy New Year,

=mike=