Money is no limit, only imagination. Don’t pick something you can buy in a store we are talking custom one of kind crazy gifts from the Gods!
I will start with a few:
I want a 9 ball pool table with the 9 planets (yes Pluto!) as the balls and my cue ball shaped like a near planet life ending asteroid! Black felt of course.
Velco Room - Think 4 walls and a ceiling with Velcro, a trampoline floor and a Velcro suit. Be sure to bring a friend!
I want Dillinger’s Master Control, Bad Ass, Black Onyx, Touch Screen executive desk! Name your price Disney, I know it’s either in a back lot storage room or at Micheal Eisner’s home.
I want someone to take my existing 2-car garage and turn it into a version of Nathan Myrhrvold’s kitchen lab. Then I want them to build another 2-car garage in front of my ex-garage, because I still need to park the car somewhere.
Then I want a brick pizza/bread oven built next to the ex-garage, with the opening into the garage, so I have that to play with.
Finally, I want them to build a nice big set of French doors that go from my kitchen lab onto my deck (which is conveniently located right behind it), so I can bring my delicious food right onto the deck and sit and eat it.
I figure all of this could be done for $200-$300K, depending on how fancy I want it. Santa? Did you get all that?
But I’ll settle for a landscaped hill out back complete with terracing, covered escalator (like the one in the Quad Cities), small meandering stream, and potting shed. I’ve already got the hill so the rest should be cheap and easy, right?
There’s this store in Market Square in Portsmouth (NH) where they make exquisite paperweights. They have the most beautiful jellyfish ones, if only you’re willing to spend $250-850 on them.
If money were no object, I’d commission them to make something I looked all over for before sadly concluding it doesn’t exist:
A frog’s eggs paperweight.
I don’t know, there’s just something visually appealing about this, and I can totally imagine what it would look like under the smooth glass shell of a paper weight. Mom found me one that looks like tadpoles, and while I like it, it’s just not the same.
A self-cleaning house - the cleaning should include dishes and laundry and yard work as well as the usual tidying, dusting, vacuuming, et al. I suppose a full staff to do those things would be OK, but it’d be better if it all just happened!
My own house - owned outright. No mortgage or anything. And enough money for my husband to be able to remodel whenever and whatever he wants to. And a big garage for him to tinker in. And a new car for me. And it should be in Kentucky. Near Churchill Downs. With a lot of acreage for my dog to roam on. And a pony. I reall would like a pony.
My crazy gift dream isn’t for me. It is for my wife. 48 years ago I gave her an engagement ring. As we were poor, we got a small blue Linde star sapphire set in a white gold solitaire ring.
Over the years I’ve offered to replace her modest ring with something else of her choice, but she has always said no, that she wants to keep the little blue ring.
So several weeks ago, I found 2 Linde star sapphires for sale and bought them. They haven’t been made for many years, so I had to look for quite a while to find the right ones to match the stone in her ring. Right now they are at a jewelers being mounted in white gold settings that match her ring in every detail I can see.
This is the best gift I’ve ever given myself…yes, my joy will be as great as hers.
A really nice, 3-piece black suit, with white shirt, made from some kind of fabric that breathes well and is stretchy, so that, should I be so apprised, I can use it as exercise clothing and have a full range of motion.
A pair of black formal shoes of a similar property.
An excellent gaming rig at the utmost top of this year’s technology. I want to run Far Cry 3 at the absolute maximum setting at a solid 60 fps without any slowdown whatsoever.
Pursuant to that, a complete kicked-out flight sim rig, with an excellent stick, independant bifurcated throttle, and maybe two erroneous numpads in case I need more buttons.
The discovery and first two month’s rent paid on an excellent, spacious apartment, already tastefully decorated, with en-suite heating, mail reception service, washing machine, and tumble dryer, very near either line 2 or line 4 in Shanghai, in a fashionable and classy part of town (I’m thinking Jing’an or Zhongshan Park), available for 6,000 RMB a month or less.
Pursuant to that, a raise in my monthly salary of 5,000 RMB.
A complete set of good, rugged, stylish winter clothing, including overcoat, undercoat, gloves, long underwear, thermal socks, and the like; whatever you need to keep warm.
A subway card that never has to recharge.
An espresso machine that is completely automated yet makes completely legit cafe latte, with an attached grinder, and a lifetime supply of Pilon roasted coffee beans.
100 cartons of Camel Turkish Gold cigarettes.
To find the two heirloom wristwatches my father left me when he died. I know they’re in my bedroom somewhere…
And most of all…
The priceless Hongpao, an infinite residence permit allowing the bearer, despite his foreign passport, to leave and enter the People’s Republic of China without limit and reside anywhere, for any amount of time, for any reason, without expiry.
I want to pay off this almost-forclosed frigging house so I don’t have to worry about shelter anymore.
I want to get each son a duplex or small farm to live on, something that generates income so they can get on with their dreams, unencumbered.
I want to shake off the worry so I can write. I do write, all the time, on whatever’s closest, (napkins, typing paper, envelopes, a million notebooks. When I was young it was album sleeves.) but I need some “down” time to get it all together.
I have it in me. I just can’t get it out there. Santa, give me a…grant?
While we’re speaking about the unattainable, I want a sculpture by Jon Kuhn. They are glass sculptures, cut and somehow joined so that each one is a limitless world of chromatic planes of colour and light, glinting and shifting as you move around the sculpture. I’ve seen them in real life, and they are stunning. I just want to sink into them.
They’re up in the hundred-thousand-dollar range. Plus you need an appropriate space and lighting to show them…
