So, I realized that twelve is a limiting number. Perhaps you didn’t want to get me the things on my previous list. (CLICK THIS LINK!) Perhaps you needed more ideas? Christmas is rapidly approaching, so I had better help you out with thirteen (THIRTEEN!) more suggestions! You’re welcome, darlings. And, if you don’t celebrate Christmas, I don’t care, I’ll take these at any time. Valentine’s Day, President’s Day, my birthday, my half-birthday, belated Hanukkah, or a Thursday afternoon. These all work for me. Anyway, on with the list!
1. Sun Lamp:
I’ve half joked for years that I have self-diagnosed myself with Seasonal Affective Disorder. Recently, though, I’ve started wondering if I may actually have it. I have very little energy, anxious, a bit depressed, I feel like a hermit, I’m disinterested in doing everything, I can’t stop sleeping, I’m getting fatter by the day, and I want to eat EVERYTHING! It’s really quite dreadful. In the Spring and Summer, I have tons of energy and I never stop doing things. I’m always busy. I’m gardening or bicycling or running or remodeling. But now, I just sit. I don’t do much while I sit. I nod off regularly. After work, I think I’ll maybe run or something, but I don’t. I just browse the Internet. It’s awful. This weekend, I felt better, but I think it’s only because I could spend time in the daylight. At work, I don’t get much sun. I spend my mornings in windowless rooms and when the rooms have windows, the blinds are always drawn. It’s awfully overwhelming sometimes. I’ve heard good things about these lights. A coworker let me use hers one day and I thought I felt better. I think that if I used it regularly, though, I might actually feel like myself in the winter and continue trying to find my abs. Speaking of my abs, I don’t get it. I’ve been trying for three years to have something more than just a flat stomach. I recently discovered that Tom Daley and I are basically the same height and weight. How? More on Tom later. I need a pool. More on pools later.
2. Cat Skeleton:
As a vegetarian and a cat person, I understand why you might think of this as a macabre and creepy desire, but…I love taxidermy. I appreciate the beauty of animals so much. I don’t have a taxidermy collection or anything, I’d love to have one made up of animals who died naturally in a zoo, I just have two butterflies. Motha and Papi. They’re lovely. I saw this gorgeous creature at West End Salvage in downtown Des Moines. I’ve loved it ever since. I always mean to buy it, but I never do. Will you buy it for me? I don’t know if it’s still there, but I imagine it would be. Who really wants a cat skeleton besides me?
3. iPhone:
I’ve wanted one of these dumb things ever since they first came out. I only call them dumb because I’ve been denied. US Cellular is a great company and yet simultaneously a giant asshole. They have what is probably the best network in the state and yet they refuse to sell the iPhone. It’s been a constant source of irritation to me. I think of it every day. I am not exaggerating. All I want is an iPhone. They’re freaking amazing. I love my iPad and my iPod and my Mac. I don’t love my Samsung Galaxy SIII. It works alright, but it just doesn’t have the ecosystem that I love. I want it to sync to my computer and my music magically transfers, I want my pictures to go straight to iPhoto, I want to have the apps I use on my iPad on my iPhone, I want my documents to be available on my phone, my tablet, and my laptop. I need an iPhone. I’ve waited so long. It’s getting to the point where I may have to just switch networks if I don’t get one soon. Of course, the week after I do that, US Cellular will announce plans to sell it. That’s my cursed life.
4. Painting of the IKEA Monkey:
This is the greatest news story of all time. I’m beyond obsessed with it. I’ve been checking up on it every single day. I’m pissed that the woman hasn’t been given her monkey back. If somebody took one of my pets away without my consent I would lose my shit. I would be mentally unstable. How dare they take her monkey and his adorable coat away? It pisses me off. But, I’m so glad it happened at the same time. The monkey, Darwin (Isn’t the name just perfect? He couldn’t be anything but a Darwin!) has taken over the Internet. The memes are hilarious, but my favorite thing to come out of it so far are the paintings people have done of him. This one is my favorite. It’s gorgeous and soulful. I’d love to have it framed in an ornate frame–something gilded. I’d hang it with pride. It’s not only hysterical, but I think his expression is as evocative as the smile on Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. I was being totally serious right there.
5. Pants with an Oversized Plaid Print:
When it comes to fashion, I’m far from shy. Odd, since I’m a rather reserved individual, but when it comes to my clothes, I love standing out. In my home, I like simplicity and neutral colors, but when I dress myself, I want all the attention. That’s my natural Leo coming out. My horoscope is dead on for me, you could print it out as my biography and nobody would know the difference. Pants like these are a trend that I don’t see catching on around here and it pisses me off to no end. They’re gorgeous! Look at this pair:
Sweet Buddha, I need them on my body! I think they are just the most gorgeous things I’ve ever seen. Somebody send them to me, especially that first pair. Size 29-30×32. Gracias.
6. Transatlantic Cruise:
I was overexcited when I discovered that transatlantic cruises still existed. I was sure that in our modern era, airplanes would have overtaken this option, but I was wrong. So glad! It’s odd to me. Traveling choices seem to be moving backwards. For a while we had the Concorde and you could fly from New York to Paris in three and a half hours. I get weepy thinking of it. I was stuck in a plane for nine hours last month flying from Paris to Chicago. To think that it could have been possible in under half that is almost unthinkable to me. This is one of the only examples of technology going backwards that I can think of. I demand we bring them back. But, as sad as I am about the Concorde, I’m ridiculously happy that Cunard still has regular crossings from New York to England and Germany. I have always (and when I say always, I mean since I was in the womb) dreamed of elegantly crossing the ocean. I would wear a suit, drink pink champagne, have an onboard romance, lounge on deck, play shuffleboard with the other elegantly dressed young men and women, sit in the smoking lounge (I doubt those are still in existence, I watch too many movies from the 30s (really, that was my era)), spend the evenings reading by dim light in the library, go to all kinds of social functions. It would be great. I need to do this soon. Please book it for me?
7. The Amelia Peabody Series (Hardcover):
This is my very favorite book series. I started reading them because they were free ebooks to checkout from my library, but I tumbled passionately in love with them. They combine all my favorite things: Egyptology, the Victorian era, mystery, comedy, adventure, and great writing. I can’t begin to understand why there has not been some kind of film adaptation made. If there is, I want to be involved somehow. I think they’d be marvelous. The books tell the story of the Emerson’s, renowned archaeologists/Egyptologists who always seem to have a bit of criminal activity on their digs. The books all have had a fairly happy ending so far and I love that. The bad guy always gets caught. Peabody and Emerson are always in love. I really sympathize with Ramses’s character, he and I seem awfully similar, but I’m also very similar to his mother. I just love the books. They’re the kind of thing you wished you’d created. I’m jealous of Elizabeth Peter, the author, who is also an Egyptologist herself! I hope this series never ever ends. I’d like the entire collection in hardback. First editions, if possible. The whole thing would look so elegantly on my shelves. And someday, if I ever get my Penthouse library, they’d look divine.
8. Assortment of Liquor for Cookery:
I’m always needing a dash of this or that for my baking and cooking. I don’t have much of a bar. I have a few tiny bottles of whiskey and a couple kinds of wines. I need more variety. I have brandy and bourbon, too, I just realized. Those are really good for making au poivre sauce. There is a grapefruit macaron in my Pierre Hermé cookbook and I need about a quarter cup of Campari. I don’t have that and the liquor store in Perry closed for some reason. Buy me a bottle? I might share a macaron with you. It is a Pierre recipe, though, and everything he makes is divine, so I’m not making any promises.
9. Tom Daley Calendar:
Do I really need to explain this one? Didn’t think so. Look at January:
Fetch the smelling salts…
10. A Pool:
All my life I’ve wanted a pool. All my life, I’ve been denied a pool. If you’ve followed my activity on Facebook, you’ll remember my plight with converting an old reservoir on the farm into a pool. I thought it would be easy. It was not. I had to dig out twenty years of scrap metal and ashes and rocks and then hack through a veritable jungle of saplings and nettle to clear the area. That’s still not completely done. They grow back so quickly! I scrubbed and scrubbed and patched and patched and then filled it with water. I had to create a makeshift pump using a sub pump and our cistern. It worked alright, but the water vanished. Don’t have an effing clue where it went. That evening it was there, the next morning, it was nearly all gone. It must have leaked out somehow, but how this happened is unfathomable to me, if 10,000 gallons of water disappear, it’s going to leave some kind of evidence–mud or something. Nope. I’m guessing it was siphoned off by aliens. It’s literally the only logical thing I can think of. So, after it dried up, I bought waterproofing concrete and put that all over the inside of the pool. It’s now a gorgeous white, but by the time I had that done it was getting chillier and there was no need for a pool, so now there’s just a bit of murky rainwater in the bottom. Probably mosquito headquarters. In the Spring, I’m trying again and I’m sure I’ll succeed, but I want a real pool. With heat and a salt water generator and tile and space for laps. I want to swim my way to abs. If that’s what Mr. Daley did up there, sign me up.
11. Palm Tree:
Palm trees are my absolute favorite tree on Earth, and of course, they don’t grow here natively. What luck! [#sarcasm] Iowa is lovely, but it’s kind of hellish for a person like me. I need salt water and warmth and sand. I’m an adult. I can move to Florida, but I don’t. It’s my own problem. But, I want to bring a bit of Florida here. I guess if you get a Chinese Windmill Palm, you can actually overwinter them here with a bit of effort. I peed myself when I discovered that. [Not really.] [Ok, maybe a bit.] I haven’t tried it, yet, but I think I’m going to buy a few in the Spring and see what happens. Wouldn’t it be amazing to wake up and look at the palm fronds swaying in the breeze? That’s my vision of heaven. So, I’ll take some cash for palm trees, please!
12: Apple TV:
This is one of those things that I have absolutely no real need for, but I would like very much. It would be delightful for me to stream my music and my videos and my pictures onto my big screen television. I like the Apple ecosystem as I said earlier, I want my TV to be a little Apple, too. I can already stream Netflix through my Bluray player, but this looks like a more elegant solution.
13: Alarm Clock Light
I am completely fascinated with this product. I am not a morning person…at all. I hate mornings. I hate waking up. Some days I feel like I can’t physically rise from my bed. I don’t like waking up before nine or ten. It’s just the way I am…MANDATORY DOLLY PARTON APPRECIATION:
Alarm clocks piss me off. I hit the snooze button at least ten times every morning. I also hate waking up in the dark. It’s depressing. I go to work in the dark and have about two hours of sunlight before it’s dark when I get home. It’s basically the worst thing that could ever possibly happen to me. I should have a house in Australia for the winters. Some days I think it might be worth it. Sydney or Melbourne, though? This would require an investigative trip. Two weeks in each city. I’m leaning towards Melbourne, but that’s just because I watch Kath & Kim all that time. If you thought I meant the dreadful remake NBC created, I don’t want to be your friend. Anyway, this is an alarm clock, but instead of using sound, it uses light. Half an hour before you’d like to be awake, it slowly starts brightening your bedroom, as if the sun were rising. I think this is just the most amazing thing. I don’t actually hate the act of waking up. I just hate being startled into my day. I can see this really changing my life. Not being dramatic at all. Totally serious.
So, there you have it! More gift suggestions! Happy holidays to you, sexy. (Unless you don’t do holidays, and then in that case: Happy Monday, sexy!)
Benjamin Phillips 