Order Up

Hello folks, it's October.

I know this must be true, because my annual deluge of Catalogs for the Christmas Season are starting to arrive. Catalog People know me well. You see, they send me catalogs starting in early October, to let me ponder; then they wait till I eventually lose or throw away all those catalogs, and they send me a brand new batch around the first of December. Out of which I may or may not begin ordering.

It doesn't embarrass me in the least to say I'm not much of a shopper. I hate traffic, I hate parking, and most of all, I hate people. Especially when they all decide to congregate in one area, and that area is in the vicinity of me. I hate browsing between two aisles. Do I want to buy the flowered dish on aisle four or the striped plate on aisle six? And I walk back and forth, back and forth, stripes or flowers, till I eventually end up hating both items and have to come up with an altogether new idea completely.

Catalogs and the internet take quite a lot of the general crappiness out of shopping, and frankly, it's spoiled me rotten. I virtual shop virtually the whole virtual year, and when it's time to actual shop, like when my office takes their annual Christmas Weekend Away each year, the thought of schlubbing through malls and being excited about it is, well, pretty damn hard to feign. So I don't. I say, "Hey, let's split up and meet at 4:00," then find a bar or bookshop to hang in for an hour or so.

First catalog I got for the season was the Metropolitan Museum of Art catalog. They sell nice things, $150 necklaces and earrings, prints of Monet's Water Lillies, etc etc in an artsy way, but the things I like from Metropolitan - and what I bought that keeps getting the catalogs sent to me - are their Christmas cards. I'm picky about certain things, my checks, the pen I write with (and whether or not it keeps a cap upon its point, thanks very much Mr M), and my Christmas cards. I went through several years of only buying my cards from the Metropolitan, I got to be a real snob about it. Then I realized how incredibly much I was paying for them, that there were some neat-o cards out there in regular places, and that I was never going to get a card with a picture of Rudolph and Hermey on it from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. So I stopped.

But not before buying cards one year because there was a great Chagall print on them, only to find out after buying them they were in fact Hanukkah cards. I mean, they didn't say "Happy Hanukkah" or "Shalom" or have a little menorah on them or anything. They were just a nice print and I liked it. And in the grand scheme of things, who cares, right? As the saying goes, we're all on the same side. Or my friends and I are, anyway. If you don't like getting a pretty Hanukkah card, you're not on my side.

Hearth Song is a catalog that always bounces along to me at the holidays. They sell "Toys You Can Feel Good About Giving." You know, the kind kids don't wanna go anywhere near. Make Your Own Sock Monkey. Creative Finger Puppet Theater. Toys parents who want their kids to go to Yale, go directly to Yale, do not have fun, do not collect silly experiences, give their kids. Now, I must admit I've ordered from this catalog before, because they have one item I love. Little collapsible animals. You know, they're standing there till you push the bottom of the stand, the strings collapse, and suddenly your colorful little calf has contracted mad cow disease and is in a pile on the little stand. I love those things. I have a little collapsible horsey in my office.

I also get Plow & Hearth, "Products for Country Living." Yeah, right. Let's try "products for yuppies who have way too much money and want to pretend to live a simpler life." P & H has socks for $40, and andirons for $120. They do have one adorable item in this year's catalog, though, a "natural" Christmas tree (with the burlap bulb at the bottom), with an adorable little stuffed brown bear climbing it. But since it's 4 feet high and costs $250, I'll give it a pass. Even though having a natural looking fake tree with a natural looking stuffed bear climbing it is some fine, fine country living.

And The Vermont Country Store, "Purveyors of the Practical and Hard-to-Find." Hard to find, I'll buy. Practical? Well, they do have some pillows and blankets and stuff, but all my eye roves to are the massive selection of maple fudge products, the lobster bisques, and the old-time 60s candies. I've never ordered from the Vermont Store, but if I did, I'd probably either bankrupt myself or OD on sugar.

And then there's my favorite, the good old Heifer International catalog. "The Most Important Gift Catalog in the World." Well, OK now, just don't sell yourself short or anything.

The first time I saw one of these, I cracked up into the most hilarious fits of laughter. It's a catalog of animals. You buy actual animals and have them sent to developing nations. And the catalog's laid out just like, well, Plow & Hearth. "A Flock of Chicks," and there's some kids posing, happily holding their chickens. "A Gift of Sheep," and there's a girl holding a lamb and cuddling it as if it's her best friend. Which is sweet and adorable.

Until you start thinking about this. You're buying these animals and sending them overseas so people can kill and eat them! Jesus Christ, how better to celebrate the day of your birth than sending a lamb to slaughter?! I'm sorry, I don't want to be two-faced about this, I eat meat and like it, but the thought of some poor cow happily chewing his cud one moment, and the next being lifted upside down by his hoofs into a crate to be shipped overseas and cut apart because I want to say "Merry Christmas" to the world is a little beyond the realm of my comprehension.

I mean, this catalog even has a special program called the Gift Ark, where you can pay $5000 and they'll send a shitload of animals "two by two" to be killed all over the world!

They also sell bees. Had I only known this during the summer, man....

Heifer International. It still makes me laugh and totally freaks the shit outta me at the same time. Please, Archie McPhee - send me your Christmas catalog, cleanse my brain!