Tis the Season to be Indecisive
Dec. 25th, 2010 01:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thessalianSo, let's start with 'Happy holidays, y'all!' I hope that the day is treating you all well and that those entities gifting you this year were generous, thoughtful and prescient. :)
The set of parental units I actually still speak to certainly were, anyway. See, Mum and the stepdad are off in Australia until February, so there hasn't exactly been the usual meatspace gift exchange. There wasn't for her birthday, which was last week, and there won't be for my birthday, though that's closest since they're coming back on, like, Valentine's Day or something and that's only a few days after my birthday. Which all makes sense, because they're halfway across the frikkin' planet. However, while my mother has her flaws, she is a very generous woman and she did not want me going through Christmas with no kind of gifting at all. So she rang me up from Australia to wish me a happy Christmas and told me to check my email. So I did, and lo and behold, I have been gifted! Two gift certificate emails from Amazon, one each from my mother and stepdad, to the amount of £50 each. There may have been squeaking and gibbering. Now, however, there is just gibbering.
...Some of you may require an explanation for the gibbering. I mean, generosity is awesome, right? It's not every day you get that much money that you are more or less obliged to spend on perceived frivolities like the audiovisual entertainment for which I have such fondness. (Yes, I know I could buy sensible things like stuff for the flat on Amazon, as they have seriously branched out. But I can do that with paycheque, and anyway, Mum's got a lot of my old kitchen stuff stored so I don't know what I actually have, and I'd rather search the secondhand shops or freecycle for furniture, for the recycling glee. So yeah.) So what on earth would I have to gibber about, and why on earth could I come even close to sounding like I'm complaining about this windfall?
Hands up any of you who have seen me in a meatspace store - bookstore, HMV, whatever - with money to burn.
Yeah, you all know and are probably at least chuckling by now.
The rest of you ... well, I sometimes have a problem with indecisiveness. It's not always this way, and it didn't used to be this way at all. I was the girl who saved up her allowance for weeks for a specific item, walked into a store, bought it and started the cycle up again. I can still do that on some things - sometimes I have a very specific idea of what I want and will just up and grab it. My first iPod is an example of this, but it's the exception that proves the rule. Besides, it's one big thing, not an infinite variety of choices. I suddenly become hyperaware of the amount I have - the bigger the amount, the more aware I become and the harder it gets to spend any of it (irony, I love thee) because frankly, I want to get the most from that amount. Besides, it was a gift, that money. If some well-meaning relative gets you something that doesn't entirely appeal, it can be shrugged off as "Well, they aren't mind-readers; how were they supposed to know?"* But when given the choice, there's an obligation to get just the right thing. It feels like you're letting the side down otherwise.
So I have options. Lots and lots of options. Do I blow the whole wad on the NCIS seasons 1-6 box set and pay the extra to have it arrive before New Year? Do I send in my pre-order for Dragon Age II and the next Butcher novel when I know that they're not even going to get to me 'til March or later? Maybe a selection of things would be better - there's an awful lot of stuff on sale, because of the holidays. I had my eye on the next Sims 3 expansion, after all. Do I risk video games, knowing that a lot of them require a controller? I thought about buying a controller but all the ones available on the site are based on XP - do they have patches to make them compatible with Vista? I mean, shit, I still want to play Mass Effect and the keyboard just isn't cutting it, and don't get me started on my keyboard-related problems with Assassin's Creed... I was thinking about getting into World of Warcraft when my internet is finally set up but I haven't decided yet and I don't know if I want to blow cash on another MMO that is just going to annoy me with the griefers and I want nothing to do with PVP and I'm really not sure about this 'werewolves in top hats' shit. Or should I get better computer speakers while I'm at it? Because the ones I bought as an interim measure are cheap crap. Maybe I shouldn't bother with books so much because I do have a library card and will probably get a second from a closer library over the holidays because the hike to Dulwich Library is kind of insane with the hills and besides, their selection isn't up to that much.
Lo! The thought processes of the indecisive! Fear them, for they are whittery and yammery and full of oddly gleeful stress! I'm one of the few people on the planet who can turn a thoughtful, generous gift into a reason to perform the manoeuvre I refer to as the 'Muppet flail'.
So ... yeah. Happy holidays to all! If you'll excuse me, I'm going to poke Amazon some more. I may be some time.
* - There is an exception to this rule. Even parents you see only once every couple of weeks should know your tastes well enough to know that you do not buy your daughter, who is listening to indie, grunge and hard rock almost exclusively, a New Kids on the Block cassette. EVER.
The set of parental units I actually still speak to certainly were, anyway. See, Mum and the stepdad are off in Australia until February, so there hasn't exactly been the usual meatspace gift exchange. There wasn't for her birthday, which was last week, and there won't be for my birthday, though that's closest since they're coming back on, like, Valentine's Day or something and that's only a few days after my birthday. Which all makes sense, because they're halfway across the frikkin' planet. However, while my mother has her flaws, she is a very generous woman and she did not want me going through Christmas with no kind of gifting at all. So she rang me up from Australia to wish me a happy Christmas and told me to check my email. So I did, and lo and behold, I have been gifted! Two gift certificate emails from Amazon, one each from my mother and stepdad, to the amount of £50 each. There may have been squeaking and gibbering. Now, however, there is just gibbering.
...Some of you may require an explanation for the gibbering. I mean, generosity is awesome, right? It's not every day you get that much money that you are more or less obliged to spend on perceived frivolities like the audiovisual entertainment for which I have such fondness. (Yes, I know I could buy sensible things like stuff for the flat on Amazon, as they have seriously branched out. But I can do that with paycheque, and anyway, Mum's got a lot of my old kitchen stuff stored so I don't know what I actually have, and I'd rather search the secondhand shops or freecycle for furniture, for the recycling glee. So yeah.) So what on earth would I have to gibber about, and why on earth could I come even close to sounding like I'm complaining about this windfall?
Hands up any of you who have seen me in a meatspace store - bookstore, HMV, whatever - with money to burn.
Yeah, you all know and are probably at least chuckling by now.
The rest of you ... well, I sometimes have a problem with indecisiveness. It's not always this way, and it didn't used to be this way at all. I was the girl who saved up her allowance for weeks for a specific item, walked into a store, bought it and started the cycle up again. I can still do that on some things - sometimes I have a very specific idea of what I want and will just up and grab it. My first iPod is an example of this, but it's the exception that proves the rule. Besides, it's one big thing, not an infinite variety of choices. I suddenly become hyperaware of the amount I have - the bigger the amount, the more aware I become and the harder it gets to spend any of it (irony, I love thee) because frankly, I want to get the most from that amount. Besides, it was a gift, that money. If some well-meaning relative gets you something that doesn't entirely appeal, it can be shrugged off as "Well, they aren't mind-readers; how were they supposed to know?"* But when given the choice, there's an obligation to get just the right thing. It feels like you're letting the side down otherwise.
So I have options. Lots and lots of options. Do I blow the whole wad on the NCIS seasons 1-6 box set and pay the extra to have it arrive before New Year? Do I send in my pre-order for Dragon Age II and the next Butcher novel when I know that they're not even going to get to me 'til March or later? Maybe a selection of things would be better - there's an awful lot of stuff on sale, because of the holidays. I had my eye on the next Sims 3 expansion, after all. Do I risk video games, knowing that a lot of them require a controller? I thought about buying a controller but all the ones available on the site are based on XP - do they have patches to make them compatible with Vista? I mean, shit, I still want to play Mass Effect and the keyboard just isn't cutting it, and don't get me started on my keyboard-related problems with Assassin's Creed... I was thinking about getting into World of Warcraft when my internet is finally set up but I haven't decided yet and I don't know if I want to blow cash on another MMO that is just going to annoy me with the griefers and I want nothing to do with PVP and I'm really not sure about this 'werewolves in top hats' shit. Or should I get better computer speakers while I'm at it? Because the ones I bought as an interim measure are cheap crap. Maybe I shouldn't bother with books so much because I do have a library card and will probably get a second from a closer library over the holidays because the hike to Dulwich Library is kind of insane with the hills and besides, their selection isn't up to that much.
Lo! The thought processes of the indecisive! Fear them, for they are whittery and yammery and full of oddly gleeful stress! I'm one of the few people on the planet who can turn a thoughtful, generous gift into a reason to perform the manoeuvre I refer to as the 'Muppet flail'.
So ... yeah. Happy holidays to all! If you'll excuse me, I'm going to poke Amazon some more. I may be some time.
* - There is an exception to this rule. Even parents you see only once every couple of weeks should know your tastes well enough to know that you do not buy your daughter, who is listening to indie, grunge and hard rock almost exclusively, a New Kids on the Block cassette. EVER.
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no subject
Date: 2010-12-25 04:05 pm (UTC)Your parents rock. That was seriously a wonderful present. And if it helps at all, I'd go for either NCIS or the speakers. But I, too, get all "OMG! Too much choice!" about these things. I got $85 in amazon gift cards as get-well presents, and I finally managed to download 3 books to my Kindle, and even that took much backing and forthing, and I'm totally paralyzed on the rest.
Merry, happy!
PS - NKotB? Really? ::shudders::
no subject
Date: 2010-12-25 07:07 pm (UTC)My parents do indeed rock. And thanks, but (corrected list upcoming), I ended up with the last 3 books in Kim Harrison's Rachel Morgan series (I've read 'em, but that was library copies and I like my rereads), three DVD box sets (Primeval seasons 1-3, season 1 of the V remake and Neverwhere - I ditched Gormenghast for the Asian horror), three Asian horror DVDs (Memento Mori, Wishing Stairs and The Ghost), the latest Sims 3 EP and one of the stuff packs. When you have to check your order online to make sure you listed everything - and still manage to get it wrong, I figure you've done well. I'll have entertainment for months.
Merry, happy, joyeux and feliz to you too!
PS - yes, really. Not recently, but yes. I always tried to be polite about presents but I had to facepalm at that one. "Daaaad, those guys are goobers."