What holiday gifts are you buying and for whom, how much did they cost, and where did you get them?

I'm usually stumped for gift ideas, but only because I'm a straight male which means I hate shopping. There are gems out there however, especially on the internet - the gift buying haven for the lazy and indifferent.

Here's one: Woot.com. Unlike most "deal" websites that sell worthless junk, Woot is unique in that it sells only a single item at a time, usually at one third or one half retail, and beginning every night at 10PM PST the item runs for 24 hours or until it sells out. Sometimes it's a $3000 item, sometimes it's a $3 item, and on occasion it's a $500 retail item priced at $65 and it sells out in 10 minutes. The guy that does the write-up on the product each day is also amusing.

Gift cards and certificates: I say avoid at all costs! I realize giving people cash seems impersonal, but stores like nothing more than you buying their gift certificates because it's giving the store an interest free loan, and a decent percentage of gift cards are lost by the recipient and never cashed which the stores also love. On top of that, in the current economy, by the time you use your gift card the store may have closed its doors which means your $100 gift card is now a $100 ice scraper. That's already happening to people.

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The exception to my avoidance of gift certificates and cards is the prepaid Visa or Mastercard giftcard, since unlike a card for a specific store you can use them anywhere, and they're handy. One great use is for obnoxious websites that automatically rebill you whether or not you asked for it, and then play dumb and make it hard to cancel auto-rebilling. Adult sites are notorious for this, so fight back by using a prepaid card since once the card's balance hits zero, no more auto-rebilling.

Most prepaid Visa/Mastercard are a hassle however, because you can't really go into a store and just buy the plastic card - you usually get a piece of cardboard that you have to then go register and then wait for the plastic card to be mailed, all with your personal info attached. The exception is Simon.com and they have kiosks in many malls. You can literally walk up to their mall kiosk, hand them cash and for a $2 fee you get back a plastic Visa card, all without needing to provide ANY personal information.

Thank you for that. I give out several gift cards, and this will work out great. I see they have them in the mall I used to hang out in back in high school.

-Chuck, Vegetarian fanboy

For gifts I usually prefer to pick things up from the shop personally unless it's something specific that I can only get from a website. I also prefer to pick things up early- I'm talking months ahead of time- so my Christmas shopping generally begins in June and by September if I haven't gotten you anything chances are you either aren't getting something or will get a last minute gift i.e. amazon.com. There's no way I'm wadding through crowded stores during the Holiday season.

I'm visiting the US. I hope that is a big enough gift for everyone.

I hope no one got one of these gift cards....




http://www.giftcardblogger.com/gift-cards-and-bankruptcy-update-%E2%80%93-11172008/

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