My family specifies gift ideas. The giver often indicates to the giftee the rough dollar amount, and the giftee specifies the gift, down to the model number. One year we were so tied up in it we all just bought our own thing and didn't actually exchange anything! All the dollar amounts were the same, so we just all got what we wanted.

And since we're long distance from our family (used to be Hawaii, Africa, Arizona) we often just get the money specified for the item.

The SO's family never ever does this, and has a family member legendary for giving age-inappropriate random items, like the year she gave yoda hand puppets to all the cousins. However, my mother-in-law has this weird thing where she always buys me clothing, and it's always from this completely conventional place, but she manages to find the one perfect item that fits great and I really will wear. Dunno how she does it, but it's every time.

I will note that the circle of friends I had when I first moved to San Francisco had an excellent way of dealing with gift giving for birthdays. Which is that you were taken out to dinner to spend time with that person. Or they made you a meal (there were a lot of good cooks in this group). And since there were five or six people in the group close enough to you to do that, then you'd wind up having five or six nice meals with cool friends. And it stretched out your birthday, so you'd have something like a birthday week.

I like lists. (in fact, this conversation prompted me to go to Amazon, add a crapload of stuff onto my wishlist and then organize it into 3 separate lists.)

Sometimes I will see the perfect thing, grab it way ahead of the gift giving occasion, and if I'm lucky, will actually remember I got it by the time the birthday/Christmas/whatever comes around.

I like lists also because I don't know if the thing I got the person (assuming it was heartfelt and inspired or whatever) is a) useful to the person (I am pretty sick of STUFF in my house, and I know that others may not share this, but it makes me a hypocrite) b) something they already have.

Tom and I don't exchange presents, really. I got him something for Christmas last year because it was something I really wanted to get him and there was a reason for it. I told him about it and told him not to worry about getting me anything (he didn't, which was fine). Usually for our birthdays we'll spend whatever money we would have spent for presents on a nice dinner out, which is something that is generally hard for us to justify so it's something we enjoy and a treat.

The most fun I have with gift giving is with the nieces and nephews. Kids are a lot more fun to buy stuff for. I usually ask the parent about general interests or themes, and then I'll go with that.

If I give you a list, it doesn't mean "Here, get me that," Mostly, I use the list as a refresher, like "Hi. Remember me?" (I probably wouldn't have to give it to Hec. Hec knows me better than most of the family members that get the list.) Sometimes, I hate that my dad doesn't even attempt to buy even 1 present. Sometimes the Wad o. cash has stripperesque "Buy yourself something pretty," connotations, but our relationship is...unhealthy.)

This is an interesting conversation because you can see how much notions of gift-giving are driven by family tradition and culture.

The first couple Christmases I had with JZ's family were tough for me because they'd say things like, "Well, you draw a name from a hat and you spend about $100 on that person."

I can't spend $100 on my brother in law! Sheesh, I've got a kid that's going to get 90% of my Christmas budget. They didn't have kids - they still were the kids, really. And I say that without judgment. Christmas can be whatever a family makes it.

When EM and I first got together we had lavish Christmases where we spent like $400 on each other - really nice things like Coach bags and gold nibbed fountain pens. After we had Emmett, we'd give each other a token book (or Amoeba gift certificate).

My father is also a horrible gift recipient. Ungracious, hard to please...well, I suppose that comes from not denying himself anything, but you know how people say "Aw...you don't have to do that?" He appears to mean it. But that's not cool to find out AFTER you've selected something.

With our friends, we usually do a group thing, which means only one of us has to come up with a really thoughtful idea. Or we can use someone's idea as a jumping off point.

For instance, for BFF's moving to LA gift, I had the idea that we could throw in for something from Tiffany's-like the little silver lock necklace she gave me for my 30th birthday. G thought, a key ring with all of our house keys, but we decided there were too many of us. While someone was looking through the site, they found a silver necklace with a horseshoe (which was thematically perfect since we were going for a "Good luck!" vibe).

This year, our birthday gifts to each other were, umm. Going to see Dark Knight.

Paul is not very gifted at gift-giving, bless him. He can do shiny tech gifts, but I think anything else frightens and confuses him.

So no one watching the sprinting?

I watched the men's 100 after the fact! I think my divorce from sports is complete, though. I didn't feel the thrill I would have even four years ago. Which is sad, because that was one hell of a performance.

I like lists. (in fact, this conversation prompted me to go to Amazon, add a crapload of stuff onto my wishlist and then organize it into 3 separate lists.)

This conversation just reminded me that I need to update mine. I think I may have initiated it a couple birthdays ago for my mothers benefit. She then responded that buying anything online was just too complicated. *sigh*

When I was young, my family never did lists and I would always come home with a box full of knick knacks that I would never use. I never doubted that they loved me and never associated gift giving with quality of our relationship. We all loved each other. We just sucked at gift giving. I think this is the reason I am so pro list.

Lack of lists is one reason I scored a hot pink and green night shirt with "Eta" in fancy script over the left breast a few years back. I don't think that even made it home with me. Jeez.