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| - A gift which the giver has clearly put little time or thought into, and usually of little use/relevance to the recipient. Alice is all ready for the office Christmas party and on the road when Bob calls to make sure she's on the way. "I sure had a hard time picking out a Secret Santa gift for Carol!" he mentions. Alice just then remembers that she drew Zachariah in the Secret Santa exchange, and never got around to buying anything. He just transferred into the department last month, Alice barely knows the guy. And it's 8 PM on December 24th, nothing's going to be open--what luck, there's a Gas-N-Go on the next exit! Now, present, present...store's nearly been picked clean! And Alice leaves the shop with a box of Twinkies™ and a gift ribbon....
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| abstract
| - A gift which the giver has clearly put little time or thought into, and usually of little use/relevance to the recipient. Alice is all ready for the office Christmas party and on the road when Bob calls to make sure she's on the way. "I sure had a hard time picking out a Secret Santa gift for Carol!" he mentions. Alice just then remembers that she drew Zachariah in the Secret Santa exchange, and never got around to buying anything. He just transferred into the department last month, Alice barely knows the guy. And it's 8 PM on December 24th, nothing's going to be open--what luck, there's a Gas-N-Go on the next exit! Now, present, present...store's nearly been picked clean! And Alice leaves the shop with a box of Twinkies™ and a gift ribbon.... There are many gift-giving events throughout the year, some of which you can dodge, and others that you really shouldn't for reasons of family tranquility, office politics or simple etiquette. But sometimes you just don't know a person you're giving a gift very well, or they're difficult to shop for, or you have no imagination, or you put it off until the very last minute. So you just grab the first thing that seems vaguely appropriate, and give that. Some "white elephant" gifts have been making the rounds for years, being regifted over and over. Gifts that fit this trope tend to fall into one of two categories: 1.
* The cliché gifts that "everyone" gives for certain events, such as ties for Fathers' Day, toasters for weddings, fruitcake for Christmas, etc. Often there's a scene with the recipient putting it with all the identical items from previous years/other givers. 2.
* Gifts clearly chosen with little or no thought about what the recipient might like. This can range from quite nice but not suited to the personality (a pink frilly dress for the Tomboy) through decent but generic ("everyone's getting Enya CDs this year; they were on special") to What Were You Thinking? (dental floss.) Special bonus points if it's obviously just been picked out of the garbage or the neighbor's yard. Monetary gifts generally don't count for this as the recipient can easily use money, unless it's obviously a last-second resort (crumpled, sticky dollar bills, say.) Likewise, gift certificates or cards are usually not this unless it's restricted to a service or store the recipient isn't likely to use. ("A $20 gift certificate to the Bouncing Baby Boutique. How nice. Have I mentioned lately that I'm childfree?") Often overlaps with My New Gift Is Lame. If the giver is especially confused they may give a Shoddy Knockoff Product as part of this trope. The recipient might say "You shouldn't have!" as a result. Examples of Convenience Store Gift Shopping include:
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