Uterly useless xmas gift ideas

[gerry]

Just had to share this with someone. Over the years I've seen some pretty stupid gift ideas but this one really tested my limits. Advertisement in Sunday's paper for $99.99 automatic martini shaker. Seems to work like one of those paint shakers at Home Depot. It's hard to envision the home (or a world) that needs such a pointless appliance. I'm a martini lover and I know many others and none of us would EVER prepare a martini this way nor would we frequent a cocktail lounge that used such a device.

Oh, and bye-the-way, there is a music connection. This is made by Waring (Fred Waring invented the Waring blender and started the company).

The pendulum swings ever further toward absolute quantification as we waste the world's finite resources creating such crap.

Whew, thanks, I feel better now. Have a happy holiday all.

[ahinton]

Just had to share this with someone. Over the years I've seen some pretty stupid gift ideas but this one really tested my limits. Advertisement in Sunday's paper for $99.99 automatic martini shaker. Seems to work like one of those paint shakers at Home Depot. It's hard to envision the home (or a world) that needs such a pointless appliance. I'm a martini lover and I know many others and none of us would EVER prepare a martini this way nor would we frequent a cocktail lounge that used such a device.

Oh, and bye-the-way, there is a music connection. This is made by Waring (Fred Waring invented the Waring blender and started the company).

The pendulum swings ever further toward absolute quantification as we waste the world's finite resources creating such crap.

Whew, thanks, I feel better now. Have a happy holiday all.

"Auto-shaken, not stirred" just doesn't have quite the same ring about it, does it? I can't quite see one ever making an appearance in a Bond movie, can you? Next hing you know, they'll hae invented a device that selects the ingredients and perhaps even drinks the Martini for you as well.

This may have a kind of precent, mind you; have you ever seen those ghastly cans marked "gin and tonic"? Maybe that's where the idea for this hundred-dollar monstrosity originated...

Well, if anyone who knows your penchant for martinis does you the gross disfavour of giving you one for Christmas, I have little doubt that it will be advertised on eBay before the pre-Christmas lunch martini...

Best,

Alistair

[mcgillcomposer]

Yes. In fact, yesterday I came across a fantastically useless item at the dollar store. On a small book, measuring about 1.5" x 1", and containing exactly 365 pages was written "Good Year".

I was not quite sure what to expect upon breaching the cover (perhaps an advertisement for winter tires?)...I say breach because the glue from the binding had leaked and caused the cover to adhere to the first page as vehemently as pianistimo's brain to the word-by-word anecdotes of the Bible - I believe the common expression is "like flies to sh*t".

In any case, every time one had a bad day, they were to tear a page from the book. At the end of the year, you were to count the pages left, thus giving you the number of good days you'd had throughout the year. On the back cover, there was a chart listing various ranges and their accompanying characteristics. I was so dumbfounded by this work of bargain-bin genius that I purchased one myself - here is the chart:

0 - Well, there's always next year!
1-65 - A year gone is a year come.
66-165 - May your live[sic] be happy.
166-265 - Go get im[sic] tiger.
266-364 - Almost there!
365 - Buddhist Monk.

I am as baffled as you are ... although, the good side of this is that I feel much better about where I am in life.

[rc]

Wow, that's amazing!  A book to tear to pieces, hahaha!

I could look around the house right now and come up with a long list of useless items that my stepmom's bought (out of sheer boredom methinks).

Two more common useless items off the top of my head: automatic can opener - no quicker or easier than a regular can opener, loud and annoying, and it didn't last very long.  Multiple disk CD players - they're everywhere, but I don't see the point of it, there's nothing hard about changing disks and I can't stand having 5 empty cases lying around.

[thalberg]

Get a chocolate fountain.  It's one of those things that sounds extremely cool and you think you'll use, but then you never ever ever use it.

[gerry]

It's obvious that most of these are electric items that are designed to do only one thing when they could easily be adapted to do many. 

[gerry]

I almost forgot, at the price of chocolate, I shudder to think how much it takes to run one of those fountains, and the kids who stick their fingers in it, yuk I once watched a kid shove a strawberry in it, bite off the end and stick the rest in for another bite.

[ahinton]

Multiple disk CD players - they're everywhere, but I don't see the point of it, there's nothing hard about changing disks and I can't stand having 5 empty cases lying around.

They're handy when one wants to play a piece that extends over more than one CD, especially if there is a break in a single span of music those goes across more than one CD; in other words, fairly rarely, one might say...

Best,

Alistair

[communist]

a good one would be a baR of soAp