Shot by both sides
In my family, there's a bit of a tradition of giving lots of small Christmas presents rather than one big one. I like it; unless there happens to be a large and obvious present that someone actually wants, of course, a mixed bag of parcels always seems far more exciting.
The obvious problem, though, is that buying stocking fillers is tricky. You don't want anything terribly pricey, which risks meaning cheap tat that no one wants. And which may well have been made in dubious working conditions and sent halfway round the world. I hate giving the sort of presents which I fear will either be chucked out after a few days, or end up gathering dust in a corner somewhere because someone feels guilty chucking them out.
However! I have what I consider to be a fail-safe stocking-filler idea, which works for almost everyone.
On Saturday morning, I took myself down to our local branch of WH Smiths. It's a decent-sized branch, and it has about two aisles of racks filled with magazines. And I reckon that with a little effort you can find a magazine for just about anyone. They're usually (though not always) under a fiver, and are consumable so do not require the receiver to find storage space. But a decent magazine can provide a good few hours quality entertainment. And if it's really good, they can pass it on to someone else instead of chucking it out.
Special interest magazines are great if the person you're buying for has a specific interest you know about (yoga, or model railway building, or car modding, or fly fishing...), although it does help if you know what magazines they might already read. But assuming your present-receiver is up to reading a magazine and has at least some interest about the world, the possibilities are endless... things like history or philosophy might wake up a brain from turkey-induced fog. A classical music review magazine, or a tech review, or one of the rather cartoony magazines dedicated to the warfare of different ages. Motoring, or dressmaking, or puzzles, or a magazine dedicated to the English countryside. Cutting edge design or nostalgic wallowing.
A friend of mine has a policy that, whenever she's going on a long train journey, she buys a new magazine covering a topic she knows nothing about (she told me this while waving a copy of Psychologies about). Her argument being that you never know what you might learn. And - while I probably wouldn't thank you for a copy of Homeopathy Monthly - I agree. Even if I wouldn't want to subscribe to a magazine, I reckon I could enjoy reading one issue of almost anything.
So if you're short on ideas for presents, give someone a papery window into a different bit of the world :)
And on a quite separate note... while browsing the shelves I saw half a magazine peeping out, entitled "NEW MO..."
And I thought, hey, that's just the font I'd expect New Model Army to be written in. Ha ha, an NMA magazine... no, wait!
It really was an NMA magazine. With a flexi-disc on the front and everything.
So I bought myself a present as well. And bounced excitedly in through the front door shouting "when did you last see a flexi-disc!?" at ChrisC.
Due to shopping, housework, visitors, roast dinners, small children and pub quizzes I haven't interacted with it yet. But it's quite a thing to find :)
The obvious problem, though, is that buying stocking fillers is tricky. You don't want anything terribly pricey, which risks meaning cheap tat that no one wants. And which may well have been made in dubious working conditions and sent halfway round the world. I hate giving the sort of presents which I fear will either be chucked out after a few days, or end up gathering dust in a corner somewhere because someone feels guilty chucking them out.
However! I have what I consider to be a fail-safe stocking-filler idea, which works for almost everyone.
On Saturday morning, I took myself down to our local branch of WH Smiths. It's a decent-sized branch, and it has about two aisles of racks filled with magazines. And I reckon that with a little effort you can find a magazine for just about anyone. They're usually (though not always) under a fiver, and are consumable so do not require the receiver to find storage space. But a decent magazine can provide a good few hours quality entertainment. And if it's really good, they can pass it on to someone else instead of chucking it out.
Special interest magazines are great if the person you're buying for has a specific interest you know about (yoga, or model railway building, or car modding, or fly fishing...), although it does help if you know what magazines they might already read. But assuming your present-receiver is up to reading a magazine and has at least some interest about the world, the possibilities are endless... things like history or philosophy might wake up a brain from turkey-induced fog. A classical music review magazine, or a tech review, or one of the rather cartoony magazines dedicated to the warfare of different ages. Motoring, or dressmaking, or puzzles, or a magazine dedicated to the English countryside. Cutting edge design or nostalgic wallowing.
A friend of mine has a policy that, whenever she's going on a long train journey, she buys a new magazine covering a topic she knows nothing about (she told me this while waving a copy of Psychologies about). Her argument being that you never know what you might learn. And - while I probably wouldn't thank you for a copy of Homeopathy Monthly - I agree. Even if I wouldn't want to subscribe to a magazine, I reckon I could enjoy reading one issue of almost anything.
So if you're short on ideas for presents, give someone a papery window into a different bit of the world :)
And on a quite separate note... while browsing the shelves I saw half a magazine peeping out, entitled "NEW MO..."
And I thought, hey, that's just the font I'd expect New Model Army to be written in. Ha ha, an NMA magazine... no, wait!
It really was an NMA magazine. With a flexi-disc on the front and everything.
So I bought myself a present as well. And bounced excitedly in through the front door shouting "when did you last see a flexi-disc!?" at ChrisC.
Due to shopping, housework, visitors, roast dinners, small children and pub quizzes I haven't interacted with it yet. But it's quite a thing to find :)