ONLY a Scrooge could resist the cheer of Christmas. But let鈥檚 face it, the holiday does have its darker side. Every year you have to buy gifts for people that you rarely see, or don鈥檛 even like. Gifts for relatives like Aunt Tilda, in return for the hideous vase she gave you last year, and those you swap with bosses, co-workers or business acquaintances, for whom you feel little kinship at best, and a touch of resentment at worst. Unfortunately, you tend not to get away with giving out lumps of coal-not even to naughty nephews. So how can you ignore the Christmas spirit without anyone noticing?
What you need are gifts that carry a secret Scroogian undertone, like an uncharitable thought concealed behind a socially acceptable smile. Fortunately, today鈥檚 technology provides the answer: an array of sleek gifts that radiate glossy desirability, yet also give you the means to express that hidden message. In fact many gadgets make fine Trojan horses-the perfect present to give when your heart isn鈥檛 really in it.
To choose the right, slightly malevolent, tech-based gift, do as you would for any gift: consider the recipient. Is he or she a cutting-edge type who can鈥檛 live without owning the latest and the fastest gadget? Then your path is clear. Give him or her a piece of gear that is just slightly out of date: last month鈥檚 computer with a processor that runs at only 700-megahertz rather than the 1-gigahertz chip of this month鈥檚 machine, an obsolete personal organiser too bulky to slip into a pocket, or a movie on videotape rather than DVD. Then watch the recipient gnash teeth at the realisation that the gift confers no bragging rights whatsoever.
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Alternatively, your giftee might be someone who can barely manage to set the correct time on a digital watch. For the technophobe, choose something overly complex, a cellphone so packed with features that its buttons have multiple functions, say. This makes it nearly impossible to select the right option, especially when in a hurry. And if the keys are tiny as well, the frustration level can reach fever pitch. Similar amusing effects can be attained with some home stereos and car radios, such as the one in a certain top of the range sedan, where operating the radio is akin to piloting a jumbo jet.
There are other possibilities for every type of person. Take someone with a simple, frugal lifestyle, perhaps out of concern for the Earth鈥檚 resources and the environment. Nothing galls such an idealist more than a device that uses ridiculously sophisticated technology to complicate what was once straightforward or fills a need generated only by other technology, such as a waterproof case for when you take your cellphone boating. Even better, how about a device that works exceedingly well but does something really trivial, such as an analogue wristwatch with a built-in laser light show?
Under the general heading of 鈥淭hings nobody really needs鈥�, a good stocking-filler is a digital pressure gauge for car tyres. Instead of an old-fashioned, simple, reliable mechanical gauge, clearly marked in pressure units and needing no power source, the 鈥渋mproved鈥� version is battery-driven, must be calibrated before each use, and presents tyre pressure on a tiny, barely readable LCD display.
Another pointless gift is a motorised tie-rack that holds up to 80 ties and slowly rotates them into view, as if it took incredible energy and determination to riffle through one鈥檚 ties by hand. Even when business wear was comparatively formal, how many men owned this many ties? This gadget has the weird distinction of being simultaneously over-teched, under-useful, and outdated-a nice violation of the principles of simple living that is sure to raise hackles.
Possibly the champion cool-but-not-that-useful gift, however, is a hand-held global positioning system (GPS) sensor to tell you where you are on the Earth鈥檚 surface to within a few metres. Unless you are a sailor blown off course or are in a mountain rescue team, knowing your exact latitude and longitude is of limited use.
To fill this vacuum, GPS addicts have even invented their own sport: geocaching. It consists of placing something of low value-like a can of beans-in the middle of nowhere; recording its exact coordinates via GPS and posting these on the Internet so other intrepid GPS-bearing explorers can hike for hours to find the treasure. A GPS sensor is well suited to a tech-oriented business rival, where time spent on this pointless exercise might well flatten his or her career trajectory.
Time is also a major issue for any recipient who-like many of us-juggles a multitude of personal and career responsibilities. Why not get him or her a radio-controlled clock that uses radio signals from a centralised atomic timekeeper to constantly update the display with an accuracy of nanoseconds. Such a clock allows absolutely no leeway for lateness and can only add to the stress of a busy life. (If you鈥檙e feeling mischievous, buy an analogue version and just before you wrap it, loosen the nut that locks the hands in place. Then move the minute hand back by five minutes and retighten the nut. Now the clock will faithfully keep the wrong time, no matter how often the infuriated owner resets the hands.)
If you don鈥檛 know your recipient that well, you can always rely on food and drink. These offer fruitful possibilities for gifts that deliver a subtle not-so festive greeting, from digital toasters and fuzzy-logic rice cookers to intricate designs for fool-proof wine-cork pullers that pinch your fingers every time you use them.
There are, heaven help us, even items just right for the child unlucky enough to qualify for the traditional lump of coal. Your annoying nieces and nephews will be delighted to play the latest computer games machine. With incredibly realistic displays and hand-held controllers that rival the cockpit of a jet fighter, you enjoy the peace and quiet, safe in the knowledge that only the sturdiest child will avoid full visual and muscular lock-up.
Of course, this all goes to show how far we have come since Scrooge. A lump of coal is mostly carbon, and carbon is chemically similar to the silicon used to make electronic chips. Nowadays, instead of giving a dirty chunk of coal to make a point, we can achieve the same effect with a tiny, ultra-clean but sneakily subversive piece of silicon.