The Christmas hints you didn't get

With Christmas just 11 days away, people keep asking me if I've got all my Christmas shopping done.

To be honest, I haven't even started. Just like every year, I plan to put it off until Christmas Eve.

I never have trouble shopping any other time of the year. I go out, I buy what I want, what I think I need and whatever someone in the household thinks they can't live without.

But at Christmas time, I go blank. I listen carefully for any hint they might throw at me. Either I'm not listening well, or they're not throwing out any hints. By the 15th, I'm begging them to give me some kind of clue.

"I don't know, you'll think of something," they'll say.

And I rack my brain, for the next nine days.

It finally comes down to Christmas Eve and I still haven't come up with a plan. Finally on Dec. 24, it comes down to crunch time and I finally have the perfect gift planned -- a gift card.

I can do all my shopping in 10 minutes at the local retail store with the convenience of gift cards.

I get them purchased, wrap them up in gift boxes, and put them under our "Christmas tree" -- which, at any other time of the year serves as a coat rack.

On Christmas morning, the gifts are opened, the coat rack returns to its original purpose and everyone is happy with the fact that they can finally get that one thing they'd been wanting for all year, and didn't bother telling me.

It would have saved us a lot of hassle if they had just told me what they wanted in the first place.

This year, my Christmas gift is apparently going to be a new engine for my 1998 Blazer.

I'm thinking the money we spend on the Blazer would be better spent on something big and shiny with perfect color and clarity.

Brad, on the other hand, seems to think my Christmas gift is something I can slip into rather than something that would slip on me.