Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave you?- Page 2
Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave you?
peach
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/29/05
#25re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 11:46am
GG - if its any consolation...
My husband and I received a wedding gift from a rather close family friend. It was a tasteful crystal bowl type thing from a large luxury retailer. Not really my taste, but gracious of the giver nonetheless. Right?
So, the giver's son had gotten married about two years earlier. The giver failed to realize that the card (to their son) was still in the box, along with the original (two years ago) shipping receipt.
Not only was I regifted, I had the cost, the shipping info, and the original recipeient's card!
I was so tempted to send a thank you note to the ORIGINAL giver. But alas, I conjured up my manners, and sent a note to the regifter telling her how ahem "thoughtful" her gift was!
Didn't change my relationship with the person, but it was kind of funny.
#26re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 11:54am
tht reminds me of the scene in TOOTSIE where dustin hoffman gives terri garr the chocolate cherries from jessica lange's father.
i guess i just feel, "wow, i hoped i was held in greater regard than that." i guess i just feel foolish in a way.
NYadgal
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/18/04
#27re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 11:56am
On a slight tangent, I am a BIG believer in writing thank you notes for gifts. Preferably handwritten, though in this day and age, an electronic note is better than nothing. Even a phone call...
I have a friend who NEVER sends thanks, and it definitely changed my feelings about the person.
#28re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 12:06pm
I am a horrible gifter. I acknowledge this and I think my friens think it's an excuse. But it's not. I'm just super, super bad at gift-giving. I have zero imagination for it (except in the 1-out-of-a-thousand gift ideas) and I'm really uncomfortable accepting gifts because it seems I'm completely (almost completely, anyway) surrounded by thoughtful people with WONDERFUL gift skills.
#29re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 12:38pm
My Grandfather's 2ND wife was, how can we say it, extremely Frugal?
As kids, we would save our allowance and buy him birthday and Christmas gifts. Being little kids with not much of an income, the gifts were usually monogramed Hankerchiefs and aftershave lotion.
Many years later, when I was in college, those same gifts were given back to me on my birthday and on Christmas. I KNEW they were the same gifts because the Big Apple and EJ Korvettes stickers WERE STILL ON THEM! Hai Karate went for $1.25 a bottle back then, an Old Spice After shave kit $1.75! Luckily his name and mine both started with a 'R', the hankerchiefs would have been hard to explain if not.
SueleenGay
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/9/03
#30re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 12:47pmThe worst gift I ever got was a freaking watch fob. I didn't even own a watch at the time! I had sold it to buy my friend a beautiful whale bone comb for her long silky hair and guess what? The Bitch cut her hair the day before I gave her the freaking comb! We are no longer on speaking terms. Oh, and her haircut made her look like a little gay boy.
#31re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 12:52pm
"I got a rock!"
-Charlie Brown
#32re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 12:53pmI love Sueleen. End of story.
"Shut up! It's been 29 years!!!" --the incomparable Patti LuPone in her MUCH DESERVED Tony acceptance speech for Gypsy.
Kitzy's Avatar du Jour: Kitzy as Little Red Ridinghood in her college's production of "Into the Woods"
#33re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 12:56pm
Sueleen-"He looka lika maaaaan"
My all time favorite character on that show.
CJR
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/14/03
#34re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 1:00pm
I'm one of those people who takes great care and consideration into what Im getting a person. I'll often start thinking about someone's christmas or birthday gift MONTHS in advance just because I want it to be right.
Im not tooting my own horn here by ANY means, but I had a family member (who was unfamiliar with this practice of mine) ask why I bothered to go to such great lengths for a present -- why there had to be so much meaning behind it, and why did I start trying to put together the perfect birthday gift for someone 2 weeks ago, when their birthday isnt until April?
For me, the reaction from the person opening the gift is one of my favorite things in the world. Maybe I remembered something that they'd told me in conversation months before.... maybe I tracked down something I knew they'd love but would never think to get for themselves (ie: I got a friend a scale model of his prized car, in the color it was originally painted when he first got it).... or maybe it's something fun and so intune to their personality it just makes them laugh and say "BOY do you know me!"
I have to say I've been pretty lucky with getting gifts as well, and aside from the generic baskets of bath stuff I typically get from my grandfather and his fiance (my mom's dad), everyone pretty much knows my taste... and a lot of my friends are like me in the gift giving respect.
I got one iffy gift for a birthday a few years ago.... from someone VERY important to me and while I love it now (it was an article of clothing which I'm actually wearing as I type this), I was a wee bit miffed when I got it. The gift was followed up that evening with a phone call from the friend who gave it to me, apologizing for it and explaining why it was this and not what they had wanted to get for me. It took a while for me to not still be miffed in the back of my mind, but in the time since then they've more than made it up to me with their thoughtfulness.
If in Heaven you don't excel, you can always party down in hell...
peach
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/29/05
#35re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 1:03pm
Oh Sueleen - you just made my day.
Too funny!
#36re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 1:13pm
My favorite Christmas tradition is the "Lighting of the Gift".
Every year I get out what has now become my FAVORITE gift of all time given to me by a very good friend of over 15 years who was in my home weekly. It is a fiber optic floral arrangement in a lucite box that changes colors as the music box plays "You Light Up My Life" His commentary as I opened it, "The minute I saw it, I thought of you."
PS He's a homo, it was from Kmart, he's no longer a friend (but not because of the gift) and fer criss sake, would I ever have listened to Debbie Boone?
CJR
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/14/03
#37re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 1:14pmROTFLMAO
If in Heaven you don't excel, you can always party down in hell...
#38re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:06pmA good friend gave me some sexual aids/toys. We quickly moved from a plutonic relationship to a sexual one.
#39re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:10pmis a "plutonic" relationship "out of this world"?
#40re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:15pmpeach, I would have sent the thank you note and included the shipping receit with a note saying something like: "You may want this back for your financial records." Then I would still be as gracious as can be expected and they're left feeling like an idiot.
Wanting life but never knowing how
#41re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:21pm
I divorced my parents this year after they bought me The Grimmarie for the holidays.
#42re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:40pm
I'm with b'way. I'm a terrible gift giver, especially if I'm not around the person much. But if I am going to give a gift, I totally obsess and try to make sure it's something they truly like. Not something they need, but something they like.
The clearest case of someone proving they didn't know me at all was when my ex- gave me a x-mas present the year after we broke up. He knew I was (am) on a diet, not eating that much bread, and when I did (do) eat bread it's whole wheat. Well, he gave me a Panini Maker for Christmas. *sigh*
Anyone want an unopened panini maker?
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. - Randy Pausch
#43re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:51pm
Addendum: there's also a TYPE of gift-giver whom I hate. they're the ones who give you things in order to make you beholden to them.
In some ways, I hate that type of person more than a careless gift-giver because it's calculated over just being dismissive.
DG
Broadway Legend Joined: 11/2/05
#44re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:54pmGifts that come with conditions aren't gifts, they're bribes.
#45re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 2:56pm
How horrible Craig. What did they expect you to do with two copies?
Wanting life but never knowing how
DramaDork925
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/4/05
#46re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 3:02pmWell, for Christmas my best friend got me something that was so not me that I wondered if I was wrong in thinking we know eachother as well as we do. It didn't hurt our friendship because, frankly, gifts don't matter.
#47re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 3:13pm
OrangeSkittles
Finally! Someone understands my pain!
(and sarcasm)
#48re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 4:20pm
another time a guy gave me a gift and it only took 6-8 weeks to get rid of it, that changed our relationship.
(sorry bad Will & Grace joke)
#49re: Has your relationship with someone changed because of a gift they gave
Posted: 2/17/06 at 9:18pm
Oh so wise Sueleen.
On another note, fobs. Such a funny word.
I love when I get presents and I think in my head, you didn't think very hard did you? I cringe especially when I knew that he/she shelled out cash. You can't exactly go, "Hey, it's really not my thiiiing." But I do love writing thank you letters//emails. :) Eeeh, I try to think that there is more to friendship then someone getting me a really off gift.
Updated On: 2/17/06 at 09:18 PM
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