Else what's a heaven for?

I hate hate hate being forced to give presents I disagree with.

I suspect my gift giving regimen is rough on my friends, but I much prefer giving presents when I think of something awesomely cool to give, than having to come up with a great idea this year bc I was inspired last year and now we have a gift-giving tradition. I also would prefer to give group gifts, or gift over several holidays, although my argument for this is more shaky: I would say that it's bc my friends and family would generally love things that are more expensive than I can reasonably spend on them, it seems to me most smaller presents contribute to the deadweight loss of Christmas. Well, I would say that, except then I realized that now that my mum has lent me her heartrate monitor and a portable cassette player, the only things I could think of that I want for the Winter Consumerist Holiday cost $5-12 :) And the main reason I want them is that they are kitchen toys I keep saying I will buy but then I want to accumulate a $125 order for Amazon's kitchen store and thank G-d I don't want THAT many kitchen toys.

Note: this is me saying that I don't need Chanukah presents, unless you have a really great inspiration.

But here's the real rant: I'm thoroughly vexed that my cousin is getting married this weekend and I have to buy her a present that I've been coordinating with my siblings - and her choices all suck. She's registered at five stores, two of which have horrible websites that don't show pictures of their $350 silver platters. At the three other stores, she doesn't list any large appliances (which seems like a good close family gift) and the only large items she asked for were either purchased or a set of knives, the latter of which was on two different registries. We could all pitch in and buy her an all-clad stockpot, except that I think spending several hundred dollars on a stockpot is dumb. I suggested we buy her a full set of towels: it's useful and in the right price range, and maybe she'll think of us every time she uses her nice white towels. Except my sister hated that idea. Worst of all, I think we're going to end up buying her wine goblets, of which I generally approve, except that it's $50 each for pretty (if you like that sort of thing) engraving, instead of fine crystal. For $50 each, I can buy Riedels! or 6 of my Spiegelaus. Grr.