The Hardest Part About Christmas

I love Christmas.  I really do.  I love every little thing about it.  I love Christmas parties.  I love ordering presents for people on Amazon.  I love feeling like I'm opening presents when I open all the Amazon boxes, even though it's all stuff for other people.  I love spending time with family.  I love eating all the little treats, even though it makes my weight loss for the year very anticlimactic.

I love reading the Christmas story from the Bible.  I love looking at the snow on a white Christmas (even though this year I'll be in California, where there is no such thing).  I love opening presents Christmas morning.  I love the look on someone's face when they are surprised by the perfect gift.

In short, I just plain love Christmas.

But there is one aspect that I don't like.

In fact, you might say I more than dislike it.  I despise this one thing.

I hate wrapping presents.  There, I said it.

It's not something I've done a lot of in my life.  When I was much younger, I would hire my sister to do the job.  She did excellent work for somewhere around 25 cents per present.  Since then things have changed, she's become a phlebotomist (it means she sucks blood for a living, similar to a vampire except that "for a living" means "for money" in her case, and not "for nutritional content").  It turns out that phlebotomists are not willing to work for 25 cents per present.  Her rates went up, and priced me out of the market.

Amazon does gift wrapping, but it's $3.50 per present.  If I wanted to pay that, I'd hire a phlebotomist.

My wife is a saint, and she takes on the responsibility of doing all the wrapping of presents that we give to other people.  But who does the wrapping of presents that I give to my wife?

That falls to me.

It turns out wrapping presents is hard.

When Robyn wraps presents there's all sorts of cutesiness.

There are snazzy things like bows, and the tag is written in some sort of cute font that is not supported by my hand.

The corners are tight, and there are no unsightly bulges.

When I wrap presents, it's a whole different ball game.  Part of the problem is that making things pretty is not exactly my forte.  I understand the whole "conceal the gift" idea, but I feel that would be much better accomplished by just wrapping it in duct tape, don't you think?

I mean, people wrap gifts and the whole thing is held together with one tiny piece of tape.  Doesn't that just shout "INSECURE!"  to you?  When I wrap something, I want it to withstand the apocalypse.  But a securely wrapped present is not socially acceptable to place under the tree.

Aside from my yearning to use too much tape, I'm pretty sure I also use too much wrapping paper.  Or maybe not.  I don't even know.  All I know is that "unsightly bulges" are a way of life for me when wrapping gifts.

And when I write on the tag, not only am I using a way outdated font, but apparently I can't even remember whose name goes where.

It's clear that the hardest part about Christmas is wrapping presents.  And the hardest part about wrapping presents is knowing that I could be outdone by a toddler.

But maybe I could afford a toddler's rates.  Does anyone know a toddler who is looking for work?  Preferably one that doesn't plan to become a phlebotomist?