The unspoken strategy of the gift-giving game

Christmas: A time for giving, a time for receiving, and a time for looking forward to some awesome gifts [HTML_REMOVED] televisions, iPods and even the occasional sweater.

Nothing excites me more than the Christmas season, especially since each year it seems to start earlier than it did the year before. Needless to say, I was already making my list for Santa during the hot days of July.

Now, I should forewarn you. Once you get together with your family during the vacation, you'll hear a bunch of relatives talking about "love" and "togetherness." Don't listen to them.

Christmas has nothing to do with goodwill or giving gifts from the heart. It's merely a time to go out and spend ridiculous amounts of money on your loved ones just so they have to wake up early the next morning and take all the gifts back, if you'll tell them where they were purchased. Remember: Nothing says, "I love you" more than store credit.

This leads me to something that has perplexed me more than that damn Da Vinci Code: shopping for Christmas gifts. First off, whatever happened to just giving someone a gift card or money? These things have become obsolete because apparently to give them means you're either "not trying" or "lazy."

Really? I disagree. I think it means that after shopping for five freaking hours at the mall I have passed out from exhaustion and given up on trying to get you something creative. Plus, how rewarding is it to shop all day only to have the person do the awkward, "Yeah ... no, I like it ... this is really cool ... I mean, I've always wanted a 3-D alarm clock."

As if shopping for family, friends and acquaintances isn't hard enough, you have to raise it up a notch if it's for your significant other, which of course further proves why being single is not only essential but amazingly stress-free.

For those of you who are shopping for a guy, it's a piece of cake because your gift generally falls under one of the following categories: videogames, movies, sports apparel or just a new pair of jeans to replace the ones they bought that came with a bunch of holes and mud stains.

But for those of us who dare to shop for women, it's much more complicated. To give you women some sense, it usually feels like hunting for treasure on a map that was written in a language we didn't pay attention to in high school. We know there's something special to look for; we just don't know what it is or where we can find it.

We also know that when you say, "Oh, I want nothing but you," you're probably really saying, "Go into debt for me."

This usually leads us to the one store that screams "Buy crap from me!" [HTML_REMOVED] Victoria's Secret.

I have in fact gone into a Victoria's Secret, and even more surprisingly, I survived to tell about it. I don't want to go into the details of why I entered in the first place, but let's just say that my friend and I were shopping, we were bored, he dared me, I double-dog dared him and the rest is history.

But I can tell you that those were the scariest 20 seconds of my life. If you thought being the only man in a lingerie store felt awkward, wait until an employee approaches and asks if she (and it's guaranteed it will be "she") can help you.

Worse than the lingerie store predicament, however, is when you ask a loved one what they want and they become a "big wisher." You know, the ones who ask you to do something superhuman like end poverty or bring about world peace.

First off, do I look like Superman? Secondly, why the heck would I want to get you world peace when I could just get you a gift card or money?

So please, stop making that macaroni picture. Drop the homemade socks, and for the sake of all that is human, put down the woodworking tools. Because whoever said money can't buy happiness obviously never tried out the new Tickle Me Elmo. Trust me.

Eric Uthus: ericuthus@thedaily.washington.edu