A Ten-buck Christmas
I had about 30 minutes between two appointments today and as I was driving to the second one I passed the Infinity 99¢ Store and thought to myself “I’ll bet you can get gifts for everybody on your Christmas shopping list there for fewer than ten bucks.”
I pulled into the parking lot and with excitement oozing out of my pores I made my way toward the door and was giddy with glee when the gigantic sign in the widow read “over 300,000 items in stock.” “Hey, Santa doesn’t even have it this good,” I thought.
I stepped in to a world of 99¢ wonderment; the colors were brighter than Rudolph’s nose, stockers were busily stocking those 300,000 items and Christmas music, glorious Christmas music played over the speakers.
I strolled down the first aisle as I made mental note of who I needed to buy for; there was my mother who is 82-years-old, my wife’s mother who is in her late 70s and my wife’s father who’s in his early 80s; then there was my lovely wife of course, my 18-year-old son and my 23-year-old stepson, and finally my 33-year-old son and his wife. Not a real extensive shopping list, so with 300,000 items surely I could find something that would bring peals of squeals on Christmas morning to one and all.
The first item I stumbled upon was a Foot Stone. I thought initially of buying this for my wife; I’m sure it would promote delicate skin on her feet, but then I thought “she already has delicate skin on her feet.” But then it struck me, I’ll bet this would be a grrreat gift for her dad who’s in his early 80s; I’m sure he could stand to have delicate skin on his feet. Not only that but the package promised that it “removes corns and calluses;” what man wouldn’t want that! Additionally, the package hinted that the Foot Stone would get rid of “dry skin.” Then it struck me, my wife’s dad is woodworker, I’ll bet he could use the Foot Stone to sand his next wood project, like a shelf or grandfather clock, heck, he might even use it to file his toenails, and in a pinch use it to brush his teeth. Into my basket it went! Hallelujah my shopping was well on its way.
In the next aisle I noticed something pink and fuzzy sitting on a shelf so I walked over to where it was. It kind of reminded me of how light and feathery a stripper’s boa would be; and it looked like something a stripper might own. How cool when I discovered it was a 4-pak of scented candles; Angel Love nevertheless! Yeeowza! There were four individual votive-style candles in the plastic box; I’m not sure why the feathery pink stuff was put on top the box but I had visions of sugarplums dancing in my head as I gently laid the box into my basket, knowing that my wife would love them.
As I rounded the end-cap there were box upon box of Brach’s Candy Corn, a remnant of Halloween. I thought to myself “that sure is a lot of candy corn and Halloween is long over baby!” But then I had a thought; I remembered my 18-year-old son last winter was hanging out with a couple of his buddies and one wintry day during a pretty good snowfall they decided to make a snowman. Now mind you, 17-year-old boys can think of some pretty outrageous things to do with a snowman, and my son was pretty creative, but not necessarily in a good sense on this particular winter’s day. After they had constructed a good size snowman in the street, my son thought it would be a cool idea to plow him down with his car. Unfortunately my son hadn’t calculated the velocity of his car, the speed he was traveling and the degree of impact a sturdy snowman might have on his car. As the frozen fellow exploded from the impact of his car, the poor snowman’s head flew into my son’s car windshield putting a nice crack in it. So, I thought to myself, “why don’t you buy him a bag with a thousand pieces of candy corn in it and he can make hundreds of snowmen this winter and create great snowman carnage with his buddies.” Into the basket the candy corn went.
Making my turn up the next aisle I became a little self-focused as I lost track of who all was on my shopping list. I was drawn to an oversized 2-pak of Pill Organizers. I thought “man, I could really use one of those, the one I have is too small.” In my head I was recounting how many pills, vitamins and supplements I take daily, and with a visit to my doctor this week she was adding to my list, so I needed a bigger Pill Organizer I selfishly rationalized. “Let’s see, there’s my Zocor, my Tricor, my Plavix, my Folbic, two baby aspirin, a big capsule of Vitamin C, another big dose of Niacin and one big capsule of CoQ10.” That’s what I currently take, but my doctor this week was adding Cysteplus+, Captomer-250, Liver Cleanse and Heavy Metal Support, along with some fish oil and Psyllium. I definitely needed an upgrade to my Pill Organizer, so into the basket it went. I’m glad I’m as healthy and young as I am; I pity those poor old unhealthy people who have to take lots of pills each day!
On with my Christmas shopping I went.
My 33-year-old son and his wife love wining and dining, in fact my daughter-in-law blogs and has her own site called www.restaurantwidow.com. They love fanciful foods, good wine and pretty much anything edible. I picked up what looked like a package of gourmet crackers; mind you everything I’m tossing into my basket is 99¢–what a country we live in! These weren’t just any crackers these were TUC Ultimate Crackers. Anything that says ultimate has to be over-the-top in my book so I went to toss them into my basket, but then I remember seeing some television commercials a few years back for a product called TUCKS. TUC…TUCKS, boy they sure sounded a lot alike. The more I thought about the television commercial the more I remembered that TUCKS were medicated Hemorrhoidal Towelettes. Hmmmm! Did I really want to run the risk of buying my son and his wife a gift that might be nothing more than freeze-dried Hemorrhoidal Towelettes? Would he really know what to do with those “crackers?” But then I thought, “What the heck,” into the basket it went.
Then in a bit of glorious luck I turned the aisle to find a 38oz jar of Funky Style hair styling gel. Okay, okay, I got a bit sidetracked again because the hair gel was actually for me. Some years ago I especially liked the way Bart Simpson wore his hair and have been wearing mine that way ever since. I knew buying the Funky Style jar for myself might put me over budget, but hey, I was willing to risk it, so into the basket the purple ooze went.
My 23-year-old stepson graduated from Marine boot camp earlier this year and has a penchant for the bloody, barbaric and the bizarre. My timing couldn’t have been better as I came upon a bin of DVDs; beautiful! All for 99¢. The first DVD I thumbed through was the perfect gift for my stepson, it was titled Rodman Downunder. The DVD was a really cool movie of Australian Wrestling, and somehow good ol’ Dennis Rodman, the former NBA basketball star with Michael Jordan had made his way to Australia for a bit of wrasslin, mate! There were bloody pictures on the back of wounds and gashes on the forehead of a wrestlers, there was another picture of a wrestler holding his opponent in a headlock. But it was the front cover that sold me; there stood Dennis Rodman in all of his tattooed glory, hair colored blonde and looking as mad as he did when Madonna dumped him. The DVD promised matches other than Rodman’s; The Road Warriors, Brutus Beefcake and Tatanka, so I couldn’t resist; I knew my stepson would give me a big huuurrah Marine grunt when he saw this; into the basket it went.
As I made my way to the back of the store I noticed that a whole different counter was in the back; the store doubled as a Beauty Supply store. There were fake hair pieces, extensions, shampoos, and all that girly stuff; but it all looked a whole lot more expensive than 99¢. I came to find out that the farther back into the store you went the more expensive things got. I found a gargantuan plastic baby bottle that was about as round as a 5-pound can of Maxwell House Coffee and about 16 inches tall for $11.99. It was a bank filled with a 10-piece gift set that included a baby bottle, rattle, wash cloth, bowl and a few other items. It was at about that point that a young man who might have gone by the name Haji or Mohammad, approached me and asked me if he could help me. I thanked him but indicated that I was simply Christmas shopping. He was very suspicious of me though, I felt violated, all I wanted to do was be left alone to shop.
I mentally ran through my shopping list and discovered that I hadn’t found anything for my wife’s mother who’s in her late 70s. Then an enormous brainstorm lodged itself in my cranium. I could open the 2-pak of Pill Organizers and give one to my mother-in-law for Christmas and save the cost of buying another gift; which made my hair spike up all the more. Brilliant!
As I wound through the last couple of aisles I still needed to find the perfect gift for my 82-year-old mother, and there it was, shining like that bright star that the shepherds and wise men saw in the original Christmas story in the Bible; a box of Argo Laundry Starch! “Sweet mother of all that’s good and pure,” I thought, I haven’t seen a box of Argo Laundry Starch in thirty-five years, and I’ll bet neither has my mom. I had to cross my legs I was so excited, the bottle of water I had drunk a half hour earlier was ready to erupt from my loins. What a find, 16 glorious ounces of Argo Laundry Starch. I read the two side panels and discovered just how perfect of a gift this would be for my mother. I didn’t know that you could make Play Clay from a recipe of Argo; neither had I ever heard that Argo was okay to use as baby powder to fight diaper rash. Jeepers, this was soooo cool! If my mom ever has to wear Depends the Argo will be great for her. Can you imagine my wonder as I discovered that Argo can be used on sunburns, greasy spills in the driveway, good for cleaning pots and pans and even to be used inside your shoes to reduce chaffing and absorb moisture? My mother would beside herself when she opened this on Christmas morning. It was the best find of the day.
As I made my way up to the checkout counter I noticed out of the corner of my eye a sale, there it was 9 Lives cat food, 2 for 99¢, Turkey and Giblet Dinner nonetheless. Holy crap, even our cat, Miss Kitty was going to have the merriest of Christmases, and all for ten bucks.
