Letter to Santa Paws

Dear Blogosphere (especially Santa, Mom and Dad, Grandparents, and anyone else who loves me)...

It's me, Watson, Yajeev's Dog. I have been snooping all over for my dad's password for his blogsite so I could post this note to my loyal and adoring fans in cyberspace. Turns out, he keeps his passwords to all his online accounts in a cryptically titled Word document called "Online_Passwords.doc". Who'da thunk it?

It has come to my attention that America is suffering something of an economic downturn, what the economists are calling a "recession". The talking heads on the cable news outlets claim that people are losing their jobs and houses. Worse yet, they're buying fewer Christmas presents. In fact, I've heard that some concerned individuals, in sensitivity to the financial struggles of their loved ones, are asking their friends and family members not to buy them holiday presents this year.

I just want to make it clear that, while I understand that we are in a crisis of historic proportions, I am not one of those aforementioned concerned individuals. I know that 'tis better to give than to receive, and I dare not rob the pleasure-- nay, blessing-- of those who wish to bestow upon me tidings of holiday cheer. Especially tidings that taste like bacon or squeak. Of course, if you could find a tiding that tasted like bacon and squeaked, that would be ideal. Some would call such a tiding a holiday miracle.

Please, feel free to spare no expense in your holiday expenditures on my behalf. We'll both be glad you did.

Sincerely,





Watson Steve

One more holiday gift idea...

... for the wi-fi poacher in your life.

Give the gift of early detection. This wearable sixth sense will enable your loved one to instantly detect and quantify wireless internet signals.

As the official website advertises:

The glowing bars on the front of the shirt dynamically change as the surrounding wi-fi signal strength fluctuates. Finally you can get the attention you deserve as others bow to you as their reverential wi-fi god, while geeky chicks swoon at your presence.

Look how happy this guy is. He has a strong signal and knows it. At any moment, he can whip out his computer and begin surfing, emailing, and chatting without fear of disconnection.

Last minute gift ideas

I realize this is coming a tad late for those who are of the Jewish persuasion, as this is the seventh night of Chanukah, but I wanted to provide my readership with some creative holiday gift ideas for the special ones in your lives.

One Christmas, an in-law (who shall remain nameless) gave the gift of influenza to her husband and daughter, who then opted to spread the joy to her other daughter. I was the sole family member who wasn't a beneficiary of the contagion. I felt left out; I was relegated to watching The Matrix, Zoolander, and Christmas Vacation while the others laid in bed, moaning feebly, occasionally ingesting small amounts of Jello. I determined that I was excluded from sharing in the blight due to my lack of blood status. I don't hold it against them. I had only been a family member for a few short months. I'm sure if it happened again, they'd share the virus with me.

If you've always wanted to give your loved one influenza (or HIV or gonorrhea or Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever) without the associated symptoms or stigma, today is your lucky day, for at your very fingertips, you have the opportunity to confer said maladies to your kith and kin without the icky rash. Consider bestowing BioBoxers gilded with the microorganisms closest to your heart to those on your holiday shopping list. Here's a staph infection to drape 'round their waists (keep away from open wounds).


If disease-laden underwear doesn't suit the personalities of those on your list, you can give some of these very same ailments in necktie form. For the Purdue alum in your life, why not give a Boilermaker black-and-gold West Nile Virus necktie (pictured at left)? Also available for the scruffs of those special someones are anthrax in black and red, chlamydia in burgundy and gray, and mad cow disease in a lovely burnt orange.



One final option for sharing diseases this winter are plush Giant Microbes. These lovely stuffed bugs provide a rare and cuddly glimpse of the friendly microorganisms at 1,000,000x magnification that afflict millions around the globe. I already own the non-pathogenic Saccharomyces cerevisiae (budding yeast), and you (or Santa Claus or Chanukah Harry) can transmit ebola virus, flesh-eating bacteria, or the black death (known in some circles as the plague) to family and friends. If you're giving a holiday present to that special someone this season, consider giving "Mono", the kissing disease (also known as the Epstein-Barr virus), shown here.

If diseases aren't your thing (or the things of your giftees), maybe gray matter is. What do you get for that thinker in your life who's always on the go? Give that walking brain a walking brain. Finally, a tangle of neurons to keep up with your favorite genius. For a video of the wind-up walking brain in action, click here. And the best part is that this mobile encephalon can be yours for less than the price of a triple Venti non-fat no-whip white chocolate peppermint mocha.





Finally, for the emasculated dogs in your lives, there are Neuticles (not pictured here). Nothing says "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Chanukah" to man's best neutered friend like implants, starting at a mere $73 a pair. The official website advertises a range of sizes; this is not a one-size-fits-all sort of product. The Neuticles website also sells a variety of merchandise that will please the whole family, including Neuticles t-shirts and hoodies, ball caps, aprons, bathrobes, beach towels, key chains, and necklaces... certainly enough paraphernalia for a themed holiday gift exchange. You can even buy an autographed copy of Going... Going... Nuts! The Story Had to Be Told... by Gregg Miller, the inventor and developer of Neuticles. (Under no circumstances should Neuticles be used in humans; the website makes this clear in the very fine print).

For the record, this is not a personal holiday wish-list. I am not trying to suggest (even subliminally) that my readers purchase these items for me (except for the walking brain).




To give credit where credit is due, I first learned about the microbe apparel here, walking brain here, and neuticles here.

Cashew later

I’ve been spilling a lot of beans on the family over the past several weeks. Tonight, I spill the nuts.

We were all so young. Little Bro was just 5. I was merely 9. Dad was only 45. A friend of Dad’s invited us to his Christmas party. Dad insisted that we be gracious guests and bring a present for the host. We had, in classic family-of-Yajeev fashion, been running severely late, so the present had to be a re-gifting. Dad frantically surveyed the house for a suitable token of appreciation for the kind invitation. Most of the hunt took place in the kitchen, enabling him to multitask; he could snack while searching. Finally, he spied an object that would satisfy both of his needs: a festive tin of mixed nuts already topped with a red Christmas bow. It had arrived in that day’s mail as a holiday present for our family.

“But, Daddy, that present is for us,” my brother pleaded, troubled by our father’s diversion of a gift meant to be consumed by our family.

“It’s okay,” Dad reasoned with Little Bro, removing the handwritten Christmas note from the original sender. “The person who gave it to us would want us to make someone else happy with these nuts,” he rationalized. I nodded, knowingly.

“No, Daddy, he wanted us to eat them.” Lil Bro felt a sharp pang of conscience, despite being allergic to nuts.

I don’t think it was to appease Little Bro’s pleading, but Dad decided that it would be appropriate if we ate just a few of the nuts. Dad hurriedly ushered us into the car. I sat in the front with Dad. Little Bro sat in the back holding the tin of cashews, walnuts, peanuts, and almonds. We had barely turned out of the driveway when Dad reached his arm behind his own seat, fumbling for the tub of nuts on Little Bro’s lap. “Honey, open the nuts.”

“But, Daddy…”

“It’s okay,” Dad repeated. “I just want two cashews.” Little Bro reluctantly snapped open the tin-o-nuts, and Dad groped air behind him with his right hand, erratically swerving the steering wheel with his left. Finally, his paw found the reservoir of protein-rich nutmeat. His hand swished through the nutty amalgam until he could retrieve the desired handful-sized quantity of cashews et al.

We had almost arrived at our friend’s house. “Just a few more nuts,” Dad said having finished his first fistful. He thrust his arm back into Little Bro’s personal space. Instead of finding his hand in an oasis of salty, dry proteinaceious goodness, his anatomical snuff box collided with the tin can, sending the mixture flying into the air. Nuts landed on the floor, on the seats, on Little Bro’s lap. Dad scooped a walnut off of Little Bro’s knee and popped it through his oral orifice.

Dad turned onto the street of the party and pulled the car to the side of the road. He jumped out of the car, and beckoned for me to do the same. “Quick, put the nuts back in the tub,” Dad instructed. The three of us engaged in a mad nut-scramble, picking almonds from the cracks between the seats and wiping hairs off of peanuts recovered from the floor before depositing them back into the decorative holiday tin. When all was said and done, with nuts lost to the hidden recesses of the car and of my father, we had filled the container to about two-thirds original capacity.

We piled back into the car, and Dad drove the rest of the way to the party. We were clearly the final guests to arrive. “I’m so glad you could make it,” the host greeted us, glancing at his watch. “Oh, you didn’t have to buy me a present,” he added, reaching for the tinseled tin.

“Actually, we didn’t buy—” Little Bro started before Dad put him in a playful faux headlock, effectively muffling the remainder of Little Bro’s sentence.

“Thanks for the nuts,” the host said, cracking the tin open and retrieving a few for a quick bite. “Delicious,” he uttered.

Little Bro couldn’t contain himself: “Those were the nuts we picked up off the floor of our car.”

Dad gently stepped on Little Bro’s foot. “No, those were the other nuts that we picked up off the floor. We threw those nuts—”*

“No, Daddy, those were the nuts that we got as a gift and that you spilled in the car when you were eating them. We picked them up off the floor and put them back into the container, Daddy. That container,” he concluded, pointing at the tin held by the host.

There was silence. Dad and the host stood in frozen smiles. I looked from face-to-face-to-face. I turned to Little Bro and warned him: “You are in so much trouble.”



* Please see footnote from previous post.

63

Thank you, 63. As I unpackaged my most important Christmas present, the tag bearing your number gracefully slipped out and floated to the ground in a wisp of anonymity like the job you perform.

While I appreciate the DVD burner, cash, and Curb Your Enthusiasm Seasons 1 and 2 DVDs I received this season, it is the gift which you, 63, inspected that I will use the most. Thanks to your thorough examination of my shiny new boxer shorts, I don with confidence these cloths round my loins. I know full well that the barrier 'tween skin and pants is firmly established, that the elastic band snaps firmly 'round my waste, that the single button holds the slit securely in the closed position, that the seams are characterized by the utmost integrity.

63, if you're out there, thank you. I want you to know that your fine work is appreciated. These shorts fit perfectly. Your identity is a mystery, but your skills of scrutiny are not.


Originally Posted: Tuesday, January 4, 2007
(Then) Curent Mood: grateful
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