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During holiday times of economic crisis, the proportion of Uncle Scrooges to Tiny Tims becomes phenomenally out of whack. If you don't want to be haunted by the ghost of your Christmas future (dying dejectedly alone, tormented by the memories you never made, the family you never loved and the gifts you never gave), then take my advice - show some love this holiday season.
It's simple enough to find excellent gifts with a slim wallet. Mothers and grandmothers are generally easy to please - all they ever want are handcrafted potholders or sappy poems of appreciation, anyway.
Beef up the sentimentality. Go for a mounted collection of photographs (printed at Walgreens for 10 cents a pop), or even a well-written card expressing some sort of emotion ($5 max even if you select one that can sing "Let It Snow" better than Ole Choir). And don't be afraid to transform a failed art project into a masterpiece for their office.
However, the gold-diggers in your life can't be bought with cardboard and poetry. They need the real deal - or in your case, presents that look like they cost a lot. For this, you'll need to take on the role I like to call the "Holiday Enterpriser."
Entrepreneurship takes certain skills, namely initiative and resourcefulness. And it is no small feat. In order to save money, you're going to have to sacrifice time and effort. But, the fruits of your labor will be magnificent, stunning those family and friends who are used to receiving J. Crew and Nintendo.
To begin, you must assess your talents, resources and environment. Are you artistic? Do you have a bunch of crap lying around your room? Are there any locales of commerce nearby?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, it is highly improbable that you'll be a gift-giving failure.
First stop, the thrift store. Now, thrifting is in my blood - it's my second nature (read: hire me for the day as your personal shopper). As soon as I step into a Goodwill or Salvation Army, I'm bursting with second-hand gift ideas for my entire (metaphorical) Rolodex.
If you're a thrift-store newcomer, start with a quick stroll around the joint - get a feel for the place. Just … don't touch anything unless your immunizations are up-to-date. Note how the goods are organized by category, saving you the time of sorting. This ain't your great-aunt's garage sale.
If anything reminds you of someone, pick it up and place it in your cart. Before you know it, you may have half of your shopping list checked off, with a Batman figurine for your brother and a "vintage" Simon & Garfunkel record for your cousin. Note: Word-drop "vintage" as often as possible during your gift-giving rituals. This increases the worth of your gift by about 25 percent.
If you're feeling overwhelmed, be sure you're away from the children's clothing section, and take a deep breath. After all, this is America, the land of possibility. You have options.
At this point in your shopping, I recommend looking for items for a "gift basket" of sorts. "Gift basket" is a polite term for a bunch of cheap stuff cleverly bound together by a common theme.
For instance, go '80s. Grab a pair of ridiculous sunglasses and beads from accessories, a glitter tube top from women's clothing, a Madonna cassette and a Buns of Steel VHS. Voilà! You have the '80s gift basket of your younger sister's dreams.
You could even take a running joke, such as the family "redneck" or "choir nerd" and fill the basket with plaid, overalls, coonskins, tools and potluck recipes, or classical cds, a clip-on tie, old piano music and a copy of "The Sound of Music," respectively.
The possibilities are endless. If you're still sitting in Scrooge-like Christmas shame at this point, we are no longer friends.
Moving away from the thrift-store scene, there are a few other options. A genuinely sweet one is to donate money to a charity in honor of someone you love. They will usually even throw in a cute ornament or card for something to put under your tree or menorah.
Heifer International is a fantastic charity I've given through before (heifer.org). Check out Charity Navigator's "Holiday Giving Guide" at www.charitynavigator.org to find other legitimate and worthy causes. What better way to get into the spirit of the season than helping those less fortunate? Tiny Tim would be proud.
There are also options for the ridiculously, absurdly frugal. For one, save up on Coca-Cola bottle caps. Dig through the recycling if you must. Because, for under 600 points, you can get a subscription to a magazine or movie tickets for someone through mycokerewards.com! Many prizes are sweepstakes, but their holiday eCards are zero points. Just another example of a giant corporation trying to mask its actual intentions, but we might as well reap the sugary benefits.
Seriously cheap people can figuratively go shopping … in their own home. Go through all the crap in not only your dorm room, but the place you return to during breaks from college.
Perhaps you can disguise that season of "Sex & The City" that you decided was repulsive as a used DVD gift for some girly girl. Or that book on Hiawatha you got for $1 on the cheap rack outside the bookstore could easily go to your Uncle Thor. Finish up a half-done knitting project for Grandma Helga, give the Twizzlers you're now allergic to for some snot-nosed nephew, take a Russian magazine from Rolvaag's free table for your eurotrash stepsister, and you're pretty much taken care of.
Lastly, never underestimate the power of food. Chocolate is a powerful political force, as everyone who knows why the Aztec empire really fell will tell you. If you're down to the wire, mooch some ingredients from your parents' kitchen and bake some holiday cheer for those leftover relatives.
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