Twas the week before Christmas

I guess this is the start of the 12 days of Christmas, or at least the 12 days before. This is that time of year when everyone goes into "panic mode", ya know? I mean you REALLY start thinking about the gift thing heavily. Instead of the neat organized list, which most folks already completed, it's time to buy for your "special someone", be it a wife, husband, significant other or whatever. And this is when the whole "plan" starts to go awry.
First you have the old, "don't worry about me, I really don't want anything,...really." But is that true? Or could you be being set up for a big fall? Does it really mean "I'm not going to tell you, that's the easy way out, use you're own brain and figure out what I really want, and for your sake I hope you get it right!"
Or the old, "Whatever you want to get,..a scarf or a dress would be nice, or some perfume." Now this one is the one that strikes real fear in my heart. It's like being on a TV quiz show and the emcee is saying "Ok, choose a door, remember one of them is for the new Porche and three million dollars and the other two are either a years supply of Purina Cat Chow or fifteen hundred Twinkies. Which door do you want?" Particularly with women. Do you have any concept of how many scarves, dresses, and perfumes there are to choose from? Not that I can't be decisive, but for a guy this is like picking the 20,000 to 1 shot in the Kentucky Derby! The odds are that you'll pick wrong and the result is a nice, polite, but disappointlingly subdued, "It's lovely, but what ever possessed you to buy this color?" (That means it's going to cost you at least three times as much bucks for her to "exchange it", or it will be placed somewhere prominently to be seen and remind you for the next year that you didn't come anywhere close to the mark. In rare cases it's the catalyst for a trip to the mall for a whole new wardrobe because "I don't have anything to go with it, but I love it, I'm sure I can find something at the mall that will work with it."
Are you feeling the pressure? Is it beginning to become difficult to eat, drink or sleep? Or perhaps you're sleeping like a baby, in which case beware, you are far too overconfident, you missed something!
Guys are easy, big boy toys do the trick every time. The less we need it, the more stupid the purpose of it, the more lights, bells, whistles and manuals the better. In fact some women already figured it out. If they get the real "guy toys" he'll be happy as a pig in you know what, and even if he doesn't need it or want it he'll act like he does or next year it's back to sweaters and ties, and women know that he'll never ask for directions or help making it work, so the next twelve hours will bring peace and quiet to the house because he'll be buried in a manual, sucking on a beer, and oblivious to food, maybe that's the best gift she can get!