Worst Christmas presents

[holyzombiejesus]

I fucked up a new thread so have had to hastily think of another and retitle, so this may be a repeat or a bit lame...

A friend that I'd not seen for a while gave me a picture frame with a photo of some of his friends that I'd never met in it.

A colleague bought me a Harry Potter pastiche called something like Barry Cotter and the Wizard's Sleeve.

[Dead kate moss]

Not sure how surprising it is, but I once went to see a rare cinema presentation of Once Upon A Time In The West and Emo Phillips was there too.

[holyzombiejesus]

Oh shit.

[Dead kate moss]

I also saw The Zombies, and Oblivion Boy Stephen Frost (pictured) was there, especially enjoying Rod Argent's 'Hold Your Head Up.'

[Dead kate moss]

Well now my responses just seem bizarre.

[biggytitbo]

A car key defroster, years before I had a car, had learned to drive or even expressed any desire to learn to drive.

[biggytitbo]

This thread is awesome.

[katzenjammer]

Yes. Thread of the year without question

[Ginyard]

A signed photograph from Roger Moore's stuntman in Moonraker. I was about 5. I had no idea who James Bond was. I had no idea who Roger Moore was.  I had no idea who the stuntman standing in for the actor I had no knowledge of who played a character I'd never heard of was. Cheers Dad.

[CaledonianGonzo]

My worst Christmas present was seeing Stuart, Mick and Sarah from Belle & Sebastian in the audience for Robin Ince's Uncaged Monkeys tour.

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

My sister got me The Wicker Man remake, because I'm a fan of the original.

I also regularly receive John Menzies vouchers from an Auntie, despite there not being a single John Menzies for countless miles.

[Beagle 2]

I saw a copy of Red Dwarf: Smeg Outs, which wasn't even Smeg Ups, and was shit, and I already had, weeping buckets in the cheap seats at Les Misérables.

[Nobody Soup]

my friend bought me quite a large panacotta cake, I don't like cake and I think he forgot this, worse this was on a night out when we were exchanging gifts and I had to lug a cake around a fucking club for 4 hours.

also a the same time my dad had started using my amazon wish list to save stuff he wanted, so I got the complete back catalogue and biography of Ian hunter and I hate mott the hoople.

[Pepotamo1985]

My sister got me The Wicker Man remake, because I'm a fan of the original.

I love how that needs no articulation from you, bar noting that it was the present.

[CaledonianGonzo]

Nobody Soup - panettone, surely?

Got to agree, they're remarkably ubiquitous and expensive for big lumps of flavourless sponge.  They've been vetoed around our way for many a year.

[Danger Man]

I was crossing the street a few years back and who was coming the other way but football legend Zico and his wife and kids. I can confirm that the Brazilian legend still looks a miserable cunt even when there are no cameras on him.

And this happened in the week leading up to Christmas!

[ThickAndCreamy]

Ball clock.

A tiny clock in a sphere on a rotating axil with a curved semi-circle around it. The person who gave it to me had clearly won it in a raffle, got it free from bingo or stolen it from a bin.

[gmoney]

My nan once bought my mum a bag of pegs. Not fancy ones, a bag of wooden pegs. I got a mug from my brother a few years ago with a fishing paraphernalia. I've never expressed an interest in fishing in my life. Still, a mug is a mug, so it gets use.

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Just remembered - one of my highschool chums had a propensity for giving people presents that were items he'd previously owned and got bored of/didn't want anymore. One year he gave me a tupperware box of poorly painted Genestealers from Warhammer 40K. I have never played Warhammer 40K.

[Nobody Soup]

Nobody Soup - panettone, surely?

Got to agree, they're remarkably ubiquitous and expensive for big lumps of flavourless sponge.  They've been vetoed around our way for many a year.

ooops, yes. give it a few more months and my idiocy will just become a matter of course. I threw it in the bin as soon as I was home.

[baptist]

I got a mug from my brother a few years ago with a fishing paraphernalia. I've never expressed an interest in fishing in my life. Still, a mug is a mug, so it gets use.

Paraphernalia or theme?

[losername]

My Gran got me 'Debrett's Etiquette for Girls', which I thought was hilariously awful until I read it, and actually really enjoyed it and would thoroughly recommend it.
One year my circle of friends all bought me novelty thongs, one of which had a bell on it and had 'ring my bell' written in glitter above it. Wore it once and the embarrassment of people asking if you can hear that little ringing noise deemed it the worst Christmas present.
Overall I've been pretty lucky really. I think you lot should be more grateful! None of the gifts mentioned seem offensive or like you couldn't palm them off on someone else!

[wheatgod]

Britney Spears - "I'm A Slave 4 U" CD single... received Christmas 2010.

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

I think you lot should be more grateful! None of the gifts mentioned seem offensive

I repeat: My sister - who is supposed to know me - got me The Wicker Man remake.*


_{*I admit I felt deeply ashamed that my internal thoughts were so callous, ungrateful and not at all in the Christmas spirit. I never told her I didn't like it, though.}

[Inaniloquent]

For the last decade or so, my mum's just got me whatever she finds in the kitchen equipment aisle at Home Bargains. It's baffling for a number of reasons:

1. She asks me for a list, whereupon I note small cheap items like desired books, socks, candles and snacks.
2. She can read.
3. She generally has a grasp of what a Christmas list is for.
4. I have never expressed a desire for kitchen items like a potato peeler, a small empty jar and some baking equipment.
5. She spends more on random kitchen items at Home Bargains than she would have spent on a couple of things off my list.
6. She has not suffered a head injury nor mental deterioration. I think.

She reciprocates by asking me for extraordinarily expensive brand cosmetics, like £50-£60 for tiny tubes of eye cream and £100+ tubs of stuff. I can't afford that, not in a million years, and I resent being asked quite frankly. I do advise her that such requests are way out of my league, so I can only assume the purchasing of a cheese grater from QS is her form of revenge. I do get her smaller, more affordable items from those brands on Ebay and by watching for sales/deals from about September, so I do my best to fulfill her wishes. But it's not like I get anything for my effort. My husband nearly lost his temper one year when he watched me having to feign enthusiasm as I opened a wire bath rack to put stuff in in the bathroom. With broken suckers.

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Blimey, I forgot how great one of my Aunties is for this.

She considers herself a 'Traveler' and is very much like Auntie Angela in Outnumbered.

She regularly presented my mum with tiny pieces of, at best, basic carved wood, that served no clear purpose - not even as an ornament.

One year, on returning from the Gambia, she presented my father - her younger brother - with a present. She immediately announced, with a wry smile on her face, "You're going to hate it."

Upon opening the gift, my dad was met with a burlap sack, crudely fashioned into a rudimentary shirt/poncho. He dutifully wore it and, partly because it had been designed for a much shorter man, partly because it was a sack, he looked ridiculous.

"It was a potato sack!" my aunt announced with glee, "They all wear them in Gambia! Look, there's even a pocket at the front for your cigarettes!"
"I don't smoke," replied father, world wearily
"I know!"

The whole exercise seemed contrived to show off where she'd been, what a help she'd been to the community there and how selfish we all were, what with our presents bought from shops, that we hoped the recipients would like.

She'd then spend the rest of Christmas rooting through mine and my sisters cupboards, explaining that we were spoiled and could she take our toys to the African kids who would appreciate them more. She was a constant joy.

[massive bereavement]

A Hebrew translation of the Quran, the audio version read by Henry Woolf.

[Ignatius_S]

Blimey, I forgot how great one of my Aunties is great for this....

We may as well lock the thread... that was so marvellous.

[Small Man Big Horse]

When I was 24 my Sister bought me a cuddly bear, where if you pushed a button and spoke in to it's stomach, it would repeat what you just said. Though it could only record for about 7 seconds. I have no idea why she thought I'd like it, and given that it cost £25 it wasn't meant as a joke present. In the end I recorded my voice squeaking "Help me", and then videoed it slowly repeating that whilst burning to death. And even that wasn't as fun as I'd hoped it would be.

[Zero Gravitas]

Hundreds if them, almost identical to those pictured, all wrapped in a paper napkin.

I don't even use white sugar!