Oct 252007
 

A few weeks ago, I was seiged by some foreign and atypical desire to participate in holiday work activities, so I signed up for this year’s Secret Santa (except some half-Jewish dude got all riled up so they’re now calling it the Holiday Giftbag). I figure it will look good on my “Please let me into Heaven” resume, and also because I’m a spoiled bitch who loves getting gifts. On my info sheet, I listed all the pertinents: fifteen of my favorite music genres and my dislike of meat and things with flowers on them. For favorite candy, I put “the delicious kinds.” I hope whoever chose me knows to decipher that as, “I am holding a box of fine confections of the cacao persuasion. Now I ask myself, ‘Are these of a quality high enough for even the Queen of England herself to pop between her dry matronly lips?'” In other words, please don’t give me a bag of M&Ms.

I was hoping that I could really change the life of whomever I drew from the lot. Maybe gift them with an original Somnambulant piece of fine, museum-quality art or a trinket to store poison or cocaine. Or poisonous cocaine.

But today, I picked Letisha (after I picked myself, durr). Letisha works daylight and sits two workstations down from me. She has the distinction of being the loudest, skilled gum popper I’ve encountered this side of the high school bleachers and I have a strong hunch that she’d make a fantastic lesbian. According to her fact sheet, she does not like bats or clownes (sic), but has a love affair with r&b and all of its lusty subgenres (especially those that are “smooth’), which she might possibly listen to with her teddy bear collection while lighting melon-scented candles.

At the end, she listed three things she’d like to receive, so I know that if I bought her a “dvd by Tyler Perry” or a picture frame (hello, flea market) she would be a satisfied customer of the Erin Holiday Store. I’m not sure she would be terribly pleased with my original art or The Cure’s Greatest Hits, but I know that food containing the possibility of peanut traces would be alright, because she has no food allergies.

I’m really thankful for this list, because now I feel like I know her a lot better. She went from an aggro gum-smacking, fake-laughing weave-wearer to a Snickers-eating low-brow comedy watching aggro gum-smacking, fake-laughing weave-wearer. I was really quite judgemental of her before this.

At least I know what I won’t be getting her. Gum.