gifted me a tampon case to store tampons in your purse. It was plastic and pink and held six tampons. He knew my my boyfriend at the time was coming with me in town for the holidays to meet the family for the first time! He thought he was being funny! UGH!

you can now avenge yourself with this



'The Menstrual Militia is now recruiting! Arm yourself with a Tampon Shooter and report for target practice and tactical tampon maneuvers. Safe for indoor or outdoor use, this air-powered gun fires tampons "bullets" up to 20 feet. Our Tampon Bandolier insures that you've always got a supply of ammo at the ready, plus you'll never have to hunt around for a spare tampon in case you really need one.'

http://www.tamponcrafts.com/

I was going to school in upstate NY and all I had was a thin corduroy jacket.

I tried it on and it was perfect, just perfect. I was all happy and grateful.

And then shellooked pissed and ordered me to take it off and give it back. She had changed her mind and decided to keep it for herself. My father tried to intervene, and they screamed and yelled at each other all day (we opened Christmas gifts 1st thing in the morning) until around 1 or 2 am. That was a bucketload of screaming and yelling. Then didn't speak all week.

I went back to school after the holidays in my corduroy jacket...to minus 20 temps (minus 40 including wind chill).

Christmas, 7 years later, she gave it back to me, although not without another tantrum. She had a big drama in her head, but I ruined it when I showed up wearing a nice wool coat I'd bought for myself. So she greeted me at the door by screaming when she saw I'd bought myself a coat.

It never fit her right, so was all stretched out of shape and all the buttons popped off. I sewed new buttons on it and wore it for years, and then stopped wearing it. I just wear parkas now. They're more "me" anyway.

FWIW, my eldest sister once told me she remembered as a toddler, being picked up by her hair and bounced off walls. She's a teaparty nutcase now...gives her a place to direct her rage.

Sounds like Grey Gardens.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grey_Gardens

I grew up middle class. Haven't lived with my parents since I got out of school. Lived working class/middle class until my career crashed in '02.

My parents remained middle class. As a single woman with no connections, I've been poor, working class, middle class, whatever...but never "flea-infested." And once I was an adult, I never lived with my mother.

If abortions had been legal in the 50s I wouldn't be here. My mother convinced a doctor to give her a hysterectomy, but her aunt found out and stopped it. Otherwise I wouldn't be here. Both parents were abusive, but in different ways. Sometimes the same way. There are plenty of people out there who's parents abused them far worse than mine. But mine were bad enough, and some of what they did would land them in jail today. That is all.

Merry Christmas
I hope you don't get the shit fits.

It was an annual family tradition.

In my imaginary Christmas I'm relaxing on a warm tropical beach beneath an umbrella, in a place where nobody has ever heard of Christmas.

I gave myself one Christmas in Cozumel, Mexico. No umbrella, but beautiful tropical beaches and blue seas. Feliz Navidad playing pretty much continuously in the town squares.

It was just gorgeous. I need to upload some more of the pix...I can still hear the music playing 15 or so years later...

On the way to Punta Sur:


Storm approaches as I leave Punta Sur:

From my devout Catholic in-laws in another state. We took it out of the attic and hung it whenever they came to visit. We had to hang it a week in advance just to get all the ROFL out of our system.

My parents gave me a set of luggage. I think the luggage was a broad hint that it was time to leave the nest. I moved to Germany six months later and was gone for 2 years. So, ultimately, the luggage was useful -- but they didn't know it at the time.

In her size. When she knew I was vegan.

that is EGREGIOUS

She related to Trump by chance?

no way in hell she'd ever see it. I'd also donate the money to a cause that pissed her off and send her a copy of the receipt.

That's just nasty.

I suppose it was a hint...

And didn't need it.

Now I do, and wish I still had it. Lol

Stuff she usually bought at flea markets. She once gave me a miniature tea set (I was in my 30s at the time). And a giant sweatshirt that was 2XX or something. Way, way too big. Another time she gave my sisters, my mother and me these hideous shirts with some sort of applique on the shoulders (complete with shoulder PADS). They matched. We just had to laugh.

...had the typical cover of the strong male bending over the beautiful woman with her hair flowing down to the floor.
I didn't read them..for some reason.

Let me just say that it involved some true last minute shopping - they were literally locking the door. I snuck in as others were let out the locked door.

I grabbed a box on the display, paid and was out the door paying no attention to how light the box felt. My SIL wrapped it for me, commenting on how light it felt.

And on christmas eve I gave my new girlfriend an -------- EMPTY BOX.

Yep an empty guitar box. My face was redder than Santa's hat.

Should have seen the store clerks the next day when I went to get the box filled. Somewhere I think they are still laughing

I hated it when I got a check instead of a present. That's mainly because just opening presents was fun and the checks I got I never got to use because my parents just put it in a custodial account.

Hats, sweaters, and especially mittens, if they got soaked the heavy wool clung to the cold.

From my date rapist.

It said....TESTER.

Now that's what I call one serious FU gift.

Is there still a Woolworth's?
Probably not, but if so...
Do they still sell 'Evening in Paris' perfume in the little blue bottle?

Bless her sweet heart, on Christmas morning mom would ooh and ahh over it.
Dab a little on her wrist and exclaim about how wonderful it smelled.
Thrust her wrist under my nose and say "Oh smell it, honey! It's so good!"
And I believed her.

What a lady.

think I gave some of that to my mother also.

SCOTUS gave us George W Bush.

I didn't (& still don't) own a hot water bottle. But I didn't get upset or mad because it was from my cousin's 8 year old kid.

My great aunt (as in my grandmother's sister as she is in now way worthy of being described as great otherwise) used to buy my cousin and me a nice Christmas tree ornament. Generally something tasteful, hand-crafted. And then there was the year my cousin was 14 and I was 13. We each got a plastic ornament of Big Bird with a heart in which her picture was inserted. And she was a bit tipsy in the picture.

For unrelated reasons she stopped sending us ornaments after that, but given her drinking increased and her grip on being able to positively interact with others decreased, I'm guessing they would have gone downhill after that.

It was apparently some swag refitted to me. I could have done worse. I know a guy who received a used belt from the same person.

I dress me. You don't dress me.

So just don't.

Mom said her bff's hubby Pete had one and looked sharp. These were salmon pinkish with matching abstract vomit patterned shirts; classic polyester garbage.

She made us wear them to her friend's Christmas dinner. Pete met us at the door and said "oh shit not you guys." told us he hated his suit but his wife made him wear it. Dad, bless his heart, marched my brothers and me back home where we changed out of the suits and headed back. We met Pete in their back yard, he had also changed. We had cocktails as we burned our polyester nightmares.

My mother normally had excellent taste in clothing. A few years later, after a motherly assault to guilt us, she told me she thought those suits were dreadful. Strangely none of us boys ever felt a bit guilty.

I swear I hate the idea of giving gifts to co-workers but where I work now it is done so I have to go along.

I have not gotten a single good gift from a co-worker that wasn't food or liquor. Therefore, with a small (humorous) exception this year, all my gifts to co-workers will be consumables.

He was so excited he went outside to cut branches off trees (to my mother's horror).

He ended up slicing his hand -three HUGE gashes, which bled copiously. They needed stitches, but he refused to go to the hospital.

He wouldn't even cover the gashes, so we ate Christmas dinner while his blood dripped onto a towel he had put under it. My mother was furious. I think she managed to make that gift "disappear" not long after the New Year.

Good times.