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(Note: Before I take off for the next few days, I have some important information you may wish you’d known sooner.)

Here’s the thing. Christmas is only a few days away, and you’ve already completed your shopping (for last minute gift help just check yesterday’s post). Congratulations… almost.

Just when you thought you had it made, I need to warn you – that perfect gift you have for your spouse may not be so perfect after all. “Noooo!” you scream (as sweat begins to pop out on your fevered brow), “how can that be? I spent weeks looking for that exact shade,” or “that’s her favorite perfume,” or “but the guy on the phone guaranteed they’d like it!”

In a recent study by Davy LeRouge and Luk Warlop (all together now, “Who pays for these things, anyway?”), they found that instead of being a help, knowing someone intimately was more of a burden when it came to gift-giving. Strange, but there it is. What happens, see, is that as you get to know each other, you sort of project your own likes and dislikes on the other person, and end up with a tendency to give gifts you would like more than they would like. Sheesh! Ya can’t win for loosing! (And more importantly, why did it have to wait until now to find this out!)

But Clive Johnson at Collision Detection may have discovered what’s really going down.

“Mind you, maybe these sorts of errors are propping up the world economy. Think of it this way: What you really want is a new pair of jeans … but instead, your partner thoughtfully buys you a bunch of CDs of bands that he likes and you loathe. So you go out after the holidays and buy the jeans yourself. Essentially, there have been two rounds of gift-buying: Your partner’s addled, narcissistic purchase of crap you don’t want, and your own purchase of things you’d actually like. Double the spending — double the boost to the economy! And double the landfill!”

Could the whole thing be by design? Conspiracy theorists, unite! Let’s see if there’s truth to Clive’s assertions! But in the meantime… I suggest you might want to re-think that Clapper.

You know, it would just be absolutely finer than a frogs hair if you would subscribe to my RSS feed!