The Yankee swap gone bad
So today M and I went to a Christmas party at my brother's in-laws' house. They had a Yankee swap. In case you're not familiar with this game (the word Yankee indicates to me it's a New England tradition, not necessarily shared by the rest of the country), each person brings a gift with a certain price limit on it. You put it under the tree, and each person draws a number in sequential order. First person opens the gift, shows it to everyone, then the next person opens the gift and can either hold it or trade with the person who opened the first gift, and so on. The higher the number, the more gifts will be opened and the better selection there is to pick from. There are two ways to play: The person who drew No. 1 gets the pick of the room, because nothing else was opened when they picked their gift, or you can put all the numbers in a hat and the number-caller picks a random number, who then gets the pick of the room. The trading of gifts is what makes the whole thing fun and exciting.
Anyway, this young girl, through a bunch of trades, wound up with a quarter (pronounced around here like quahtah) roll of $10 -- the cash limit for the swap gifts. Another dude opened our gift, a box of chocolates, and went over to the girl, saying, "Life is tough, kid. I'm taking your quahtahs." Now, had he done that to M or me, we would have just laughed and gone on. This girl, who looked about 7 or 8, started biting her lip to keep from crying. Everyone started razzing the dude, saying, "Look, you made her cry," which, of course, made her burst into tears and hide her face. The guy wound up chasing her out of the room and trying to give her back the quahtahs, but she was really upset. Man, these things can get cutthroat, but I've never seen anyone lose it before. Anyway, we got a crappy mirror and the apple pie-scented candle we came with (I loved it and decided I wanted to keep it). Sometimes you leave with great stuff; other times, you leave with crap.
I spent a good chunk of this weekend doing all the Christmas chores that need to be done, like wrapping and baking. I only have a handful of gifts left to wrap and a bit more baking. I love this time of year so much, but I often think people of other religions who don't celebrate Christmas laugh at us Christians and how nutty we get over the holiday. The way I look at it, everyone celebrates something this time of year, whether it be Christmas or Hanukkah or Diwali or Ramadan or Kwanzaa. So happy holidays does it for me.
Anyway, this young girl, through a bunch of trades, wound up with a quarter (pronounced around here like quahtah) roll of $10 -- the cash limit for the swap gifts. Another dude opened our gift, a box of chocolates, and went over to the girl, saying, "Life is tough, kid. I'm taking your quahtahs." Now, had he done that to M or me, we would have just laughed and gone on. This girl, who looked about 7 or 8, started biting her lip to keep from crying. Everyone started razzing the dude, saying, "Look, you made her cry," which, of course, made her burst into tears and hide her face. The guy wound up chasing her out of the room and trying to give her back the quahtahs, but she was really upset. Man, these things can get cutthroat, but I've never seen anyone lose it before. Anyway, we got a crappy mirror and the apple pie-scented candle we came with (I loved it and decided I wanted to keep it). Sometimes you leave with great stuff; other times, you leave with crap.
I spent a good chunk of this weekend doing all the Christmas chores that need to be done, like wrapping and baking. I only have a handful of gifts left to wrap and a bit more baking. I love this time of year so much, but I often think people of other religions who don't celebrate Christmas laugh at us Christians and how nutty we get over the holiday. The way I look at it, everyone celebrates something this time of year, whether it be Christmas or Hanukkah or Diwali or Ramadan or Kwanzaa. So happy holidays does it for me.
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