# Help me make my dad a Xmas present **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 3, 2013, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386 "2013-12-03T17:18:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![JohnnyMac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@JohnnyMac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnnyMac)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/1 "2013-12-03T17:18:49Z")
Okay, so: my parents are much better off than I am, and they like _nice_ stuff. Read: good quality, interesting, beyond my price range. I usually get my father black pudding, pate, exotic meats, but I’ve done that for the last couple of years and it’s getting a bit old. So, here’s my thought. What I’m good at is art. Drawing, painting, ink, pencils, charcoal. I can do that, and I can do it to a pretty professional standard. My dad’s tastes run down just the same lines as the Dope: astrophysics, science, philosophy. He likes the strange and weird, too, but interesting, clever weird. Think Philip K Dick stuff. What’s something I can illustrate - an idea, concept, map of reactions; something he’ll find interesting and possibly something he didn’t know before now? Please help me out here. It’s difficult getting gifts for people who make a lot more money than you do, and I feel like this idea has real potential if I can just hit on the right…thing. ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/2 "2013-12-03T17:40:54Z")
How about Larry Niven’s Ringworld? ---
**Author:** ![Casey1505](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dc4da7/32.png) [@Casey1505](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Casey1505)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/3 "2013-12-03T17:46:31Z")
Speaking as a father, my most cherished gift from my oldest son is a baseball he autographed and put in a display case. Investment of about $5 and ten seconds of his time. Point is, I’m sorry that you feel you need to impress your father with valuable or exotic things. Draw a picture of the two of you at a place you’ve both imagined going but never have yet. Show him that a dream he shared with you as a child still lives in his son years later. If you ever get to that place, take a photograph to match the drawing. ---
**Author:** ![Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/prof.pepperwinkle/32/13627_2.png) [@Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Prof.Pepperwinkle)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/4 "2013-12-03T17:50:22Z")
Expanding on Casey1505, you could draw the two of you together in a _Blade Runner_ or _Total Recall_ type of setting (both taken from works by Philip K. Dick). ---
**Author:** ![JohnnyMac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@JohnnyMac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnnyMac)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/5 "2013-12-03T17:56:25Z")
> [@Casey1505](#): > > Speaking as a father, my most cherished gift from my oldest son is a baseball he autographed and put in a display case. Investment of about $5 and ten seconds of his time. > > Point is, I’m sorry that you feel you need to impress your father with valuable or exotic things. Draw a picture of the two of you at a place you’ve both imagined going but never have yet. Show him that a dream he shared with you as a child still lives in his son years later. If you ever get to that place, take a photograph to match the drawing. If I buy something, I feel it should be something he likes and wouldn’t necessarily buy for himself. I feel like that’s a basic gift-giving principle, unless someone _needs_ something. I am planning to create something here. But a picture like that…we don’t really have any shared goals or dreams like that. Although actually, you have given me an idea. He used to tell us D&D style bedtime stories as kids - he wrote one of them up into a proper kids’ book but never got it published. I could illustrate it as a comic. I might make a start on that but keep my eye out for a backup, as that might be too big a project to tackle so close to Christmas. ---
**Author:** ![shantih](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f6c823/32.png) [@shantih](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shantih)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/6 "2013-12-03T20:17:58Z")
What about creating a cover for that story as your Christmas present, with the possibility of doing more in the future? ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2013, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-make-my-dad-a-xmas-present/675386/7 "2013-12-03T21:26:12Z")
> [@shantih](#): > > What about creating a cover for that story as your Christmas present, with the possibility of doing more in the future? This exactly. Do a cover illustration, title, put his name as author and yours as illustrator. Some cute made-up “publisher” name. Frame it.