best white elephant gift ever

a friday or two ago, i was invited to an ugly Christmas sweater party at my friend kristin's house (other kristin). this made me regret not pouncing on one of a handful of amazing Christmas sweaters i had been following on ebay early in november. for a while now, i've wanted a moderately bad Christmas sweater, preferably akin to the the knit one with reindeer that kevin costner wears during the montage of seasons in "field of dreams."

the day of the party, tim and i went to check d.i. for such a textile monstrosity. the provo d.i. is such a gamble, becuase in a town with 30,000 byu students, anything remotely amazing that shows up there will be gone almost immediately. in the 104 days we found our best disco skating clothes at savers (jack, i still have your sequined shirt, should you ever have an excuse to wear it agian). as such, this visit turned up little more than another guy and his wife also perusing the "knit sweater" rack with equal futility.

while i did not find any appropriate Christmas sweater, i did strike gold with for the other part of the party, the white elephant gift.
in the front of d.i. is where they keep most of their "valuables", anything particularly unique or interesting. it also costs more than most things in the store (i.e. above $6), but you can find some real treasures in there.
piled on a rack against the front window, still in its re-taped together box, from the 2000 world tour, was a set of five n*sync marionette dolls. strings and everything. it was incredible. and for $10. i swiped them up and proudly took them to the cashier who unsuccessfully tried to suppress confusion until we explained that they were a white elephant gift.

i was so proud of myself.

thankfully, at the party, the person who drew my gift had an equally fine sense of humor, as her friend shouted out "that's the best white elephant gift ever!" by the time i was leaving, they were using their cell phones to film their own music video on the kitchen table.