So with the daughters visiting from college for the Christmas break, they both have brought big empty duffle bags in which to pack their boodle back to campus when they leave.

So where do we learn these pack rat skills from that fill our garages and spare bedrooms with gear? I guess I am starting to understand a bit better now. I am teaching it to my girls as well.

The girls are making quite a haul this year. Probably $2k between the two of them. I am giving the younger one my guitar, er, Sierra Nevada mouse trap, which gets it off my hands now. I wasn't playing it much anyways, and she asked for a nice steel string, so I can kill two birds with one stone there, and maybe upgrade to a better mouse trap sometime.

Then there's the usual clothing array to redo their wardrobe with. I get hit with that one at least twice a year.

If they were closer than a plane flight, they'd be going home with a load of surplus foodstuffs to get them by for a couple months. College students can never have enough noodles.

I had the wife wrap up all the items that the youngest left during her stay with me this last summer. She gets to open those before christmas cuz some of it needs to be consumed rather than transported again. Then there are the Lord God Humungous Professional cookbooks I got that she wasn't able to pack with her last time.

I suspect they will leave at least one load of goodies with us to ship to them after they return to school.

Oh yeah, they'll each get a trip to the doctor for a good once over, including eye exams and such. That pretty much kills the rest of the Christmas budget.

So how about the rest of ya.

DD1 (5yr) is getting her very own wristwatch, some personalized stationary with a fairy motiff, and three pretty dresses. DD2 (3yr) is getting "Moon Sand", and a big box of crayons. Grandma and grandpa arrive tomorrow so their haul will be greatly enhanced at that time. Knowing grandpa, there's probably a fishing pole in DD1's future. She'll love that!

I'm getting rain gutters and the movie "House of Flying Daggers". DW hasn't told me yet what I got her, but she's really smiling and has hid the checkbook.

-Blast

Oh yeah, forgot to mention, bought Christmas for a Salvation Army single parent family, and some presents from the gift tree at the mall as well. Sure is nice having enough to go around to share with others like this. Does a soul good.

+5 on that. We've had many blessing this year and know they aren't all meant just for us.

-Blast

DW got a new laptop computer, printer, and a boat load of software since she's back to college again. Helped out a couple of "brothers" who are having a rough time due to major illness in the families.

DW takes care of the rest of the extended family, thankfully, because I hate to shop.

I get the rest of the year OFF, starting today. I was caught in the "use it or lose it" mode on annual leave time. I won't give'm any more back. As for my Christmas present, probably the same stuff I get every year. Frankly, I'd just as soon have cash. Ya can't send folks to buy gear and expect them to get it right. Going to a major Gun Show tomorrow, who knows what might be found, hehehe.

Wow.

We aren't buying any gifts this year, for anyone. This is only a slight change from previous years, in which we limited our gift purchasing to $400 in total for the entire Xmas budget, for all gifts purchased, regardless of recipient.

This year we are making ONE (nice) gift per child, and my wife and I are not really sure what we're doing for each other this time, I want a hat and she wants these weight things that hold down fabric when laying out a pattern. I can make those with some lead shot.

I asked that my family not give me any gifts, and instead donate to http://www.mercycorps.org/

We have been working, with some moderate success, at undoing the endless cycle of consume/discard that complicates our lives. Even my "emergency supplies" cache is both comprehensive and trim, if that makes any sense.

I have a long way to go before I can really say I've cleared the packrat mind, I may never do it. But we don't "do" the Christmas buying frenzy, and have not for about 5 years now, and that's working for us.

Friend, you already paid back me. Your Getting a youngster started on fishing post will save me a lot of frustration and wasted effort, not to mention make my dad and my girls very, very happy.

-Blast

Don't forget 2009 fishing, hunting, and etcetera licenses.

The DW has given me a "wish list" that will take at least a year to give her.

Back to a wise hubby's wisdom: I'm going to school next week (taking DW with me) and when I get back, I'm going shopping for DW so I can at least surprise her with a few things that I know that she likes.

(Blast, Librarian, Kmat, and Clarktx--we'll meet y'all next week!!)

Yes, I am smart enough NOT to get her any gifts that I would love but she wouldn't!!!

My dad, a copy of Munchkin. It's a great game, and I'm taking mine when I get a real place, so he'll need his own copy.

My mother is into explorer and medical biographies, so she's getting bios from antarctic and an everest doc.

Both are getting small kits they can stash in their cars, built into German-pattern mess pots.

My brother is getting flash drives. He needs a couple, and I had a good price on a couple of 8 gigs. I'll preload one with portable applications.

Extended family, donations in their name and chipping in on the family baskets.

Past three months, when I do my weekly shopping, I buy a ten dollar food shelf bag- my grocery store has them prepacked, just put them in your cart go up front. And I bought a small turkey for the food shelf for thanksgiving, and I've pledged a small, uncanned ham for christmas- pay for it next week.

For me, I'm still hemming and hawing. I need a new pack. It is down to the Jansport Carson which I like, and some other gear, or the Northface Crestone 75 which I REALLY(!!) like. I had them put 40 pounds in the Crestone, walked around for twenty minutes, asked for another ten. An hour later, we were up to 70 pounds and it was still comfy.

You hope.
I'm sending some excess gear to friends on the forums I visit. Will try to send a few $$ to Doug for the ETS foundation.
Me I want nothing

No haul for Christmas this year. It's been a bad one.

I did manage to put a little aside so that I could get something for my oldest niece. Luckily the younger two (another niece and a nephew) are too young to know anything other than a bunch of presents appeared in their home or where they came from so I won't look like some kind of complete joke/humbug.

The big bummer is that I won't be able to go visit the family because my car is in need of some major repairs.

I've still got a roof over my head though, so things could easily be worse. I'm not going to let it all be a downer though. I may take a little trip into the woods and go cold weather camping for a few days. Nobody likes to do that with me anyway. LOL

You have to look for the good stuff too.

Izzy,
Does the Cheaper-Than-Dirt M2 clone need separate tac-ties or Malice clips to attach it to Molle gear like the Maxpedition versions?

I personally didn't ask for anything this year. However, I'm planning on buying/building a new computer for myself after Christmas (when hopefully the price of the new Core i7 stuff will go down a bit and become more available). My current computer is five years old and starting to really feel the pain of my photo editing, presentations, documents, gaming, ect.

As far as everyone else, I figure they're getting either gift certificates or some cash. I'm not going crazy this year shopping before Christmas and neither is the rest of my family.

With that said, everyone is getting a nice gift from my near 90 year old grandmother, as she is paying for everyone in the family to spend a week in Aruba this upcoming January. She figures she doesn't have too much time left, and wants to spend the time she does have left with the family while she is still in good shape and can still travel. To make things even better I just found out I have enough airline miles racked up over the years to convert my seats to first class. I'm hoping that's a good sign of things to come and we wind up having a great trip.

My buddy ClarkTX has that pack. It's SWEET! Plus he got it on a clearance sale for like 50% off. I was with him at the time and I'm still kicking myself for not buying one also. But us both having the same pack would have looked too...friendly.


You should get her "River of Doubt". It's about Teddy Roosevelt's expedition down an uncharted portion of the Amazon river. I couldn't put it down!

-Blast

My wife and I also do not buy Christmas gifts for each other. Haven't for several years. Yeah, we're fighting raging consumerism.



Actually, each of us just goes out and buys whatever we want and then says to the other one, "You bought me a __________ this year for Christmas, Honey."

I'm getting my brother a copy of When All Hell Breaks Loose. His wife is getting a copy of Just In Case.
I asked for socks.

Munchkin is definitely a great little game. I have Space Munchin. I actually got my wife playing Fluxx, which is an addictive card game as well.

It is a tighter Christmas for us this year. My little guy is just 9 months old. Pretty much any extra money I've had has gone to keeping him healthy and fed. We got the family to agree to keep things simpler this year. He's going to be spoiled pretty well tho.

That isn't to say that I didn't take care of getting things for my wife. I'll be getting a bonus after the end of the year, so I'll use a portion of that for myself. Maybe that Garmin handheld GPS that I've had my eye on for over a year.

Man, we need to get together sometime. You bring yours, I'll bring mine and we can have Double Munchkin!

-Blast

*laguhs* If we can ever pull off the ETS-con, I have reason to think that there will be a lot of gaming. Almost as much as there is range time. :P

I can see the ETS-con now...

Emergency happens at the con... Everyone survives. Actually go out of the way to not be rescued as we are having too much fun gaming.

And if y'all are real good I'll bring my Buffy the Vampire Slayer board game! Best. Game. Ever.

-Blast

Is it the original Buffy, or the TV version?

What, no Zombies!!!

TV version. You get to replay the first four or so seasons. Up through the cyborg Adam, anyway. It's kind of like cross between D&D, Clue, and nothing else I've ever played.

-Blast

I'll bring Cults Across America- you can't go wrong with an archpriest of Cthulu, in the demonic pushcart, with a flame thrower and the head of the CDC, on a road trip from Arkham to Ryloth.

As far as Christmas stuff goes, I tend to get myself stuff cause it's just easier.

This year let's see, just ordered a few things from County Comm, some SoLed lights, couple of Grimlocs, kevlar thread, cleaning stick, and a couple of P51's.

Also ordered a couple of books thru Amazon, mostly for work but for personal use too, "where there is no doctor" and a PDR for non-prescription/homeopathic/OTC drugs.

Got myself a cool LED BBQ light for work, will light up my work space on long night shoots.

I grabbed a couple of Camelbak rucksacks off of ebay earlier this year and am just now getting around to using them so I'll count those too.

Probably getting a diagnostic guide to patient symptoms medical book from my girlfriend and a couple of gift cards.

Oh, I picked up some parts to make a temporary antenna setup for my Ham gear to use when I'm called out on an ARES event, it's more fun than anything else, so I guess that counts as a present too.

I'm trying not to think of how much stuff the kids got...;^)

JohnE