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Quirky Holiday Gift Guide By Brian Neill Time is quickly running out for those of you who’ve put off braving the malls and aisles of Target and Wal-Mart until the last moment. Oh, what to get? What to do? Well, fret no more. Leave the Norelco razors to those middle-aged suburbanites. Perfume, schmerfume. Behold, a list that will leave the badly feigned, “Wow, just what I wanted” to the fathers opening yet more Christmas ties from the kids. A list that will cause others sitting around the Christmas tree to drool with envy as they watch your chosen recipient opening his or her gift. So get to shopping people. The future of $400,000 robot couples is in your hands.
Ever seen those inspirational posters hanging in places like government offices? You know, the ones with the breathtaking photographs of soaring eagles and snowcapped mountaintops underscored by lofty words like, “Determination” and “Aspiration”? Well, Despair, Inc. has something totally different and hilarious in mind. Its “Demotivational” posters feature the same type of wonderful photographs, but the messages they carry are nothing a mid-level manager would want her staffers to abide by. One lithograph poster features a spawning salmon leaping upstream toward a grizzly bear’s mouth. Beneath it are the words, “AMBITION: The Journey of a thousand miles sometimes ends very, very badly.” Another features a sunset over a pristine lake and rocky shore, with the message, “MOTIVATION: If a pretty poster and cute saying are all it takes to motivate you, you probably have a very easy job. The kind robots will be doing soon.” The posters, measuring 24 x 30 inches, are $15.95. They also are available in notecards (6 for $9.95); framed, 5x7 “Desktoppers” ($15.95); and 24 x 30-inch lithographs in ebony wood frames with glass ($109.95). Despair, Inc. also offers a variety of T-shirts and novelties sure to put a smile on even the most morose of you out there. (www.despair.com; 1-877-DESPAIR).
Augusta being a golfing town, what better Christmas present to give than a set of gag golf balls from Baron Bob Gifts. The company offers a $9.95 set of three: The Exploder, which blows up in a cloud of smoke-like powder; The Jetstreamer, which, upon impact, changes into 15 feet of streaming, spiraling ribbon; and The Unputtaball, which wobbles, skids and gyrates, never going in a straight line. Baron Bob’s also has some other choice gifts, like a gasoline-powered blender with handlebars and throttle ($254.95, plus $20 S&H). There’s also a glowing, life-like brain floating in a see-through, bubbling, self-contained unit reminiscent of those often featured in 1950s horror films ($225). “It’s great as an office oddity, or Halloween effect,” reads the online catalog description. “The constant bubbling can even be relaxing.” Yeah, if you could manage to forget for a moment there was a fake brain floating around in there. (www.wonderfullywacky.com).