Bigger isn’t always better

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I was just chatting to a colleague, Louise, and she was telling me about the men in her family and their gift-giving habits. It seems that even when they have been told exactly what the recipient would like, they have to go for a ‘bigger must be better’ approach instead. Louise does some silver-smithing as a hobby. For her 40th birthday she suggested to her brother that she would like a small polishing machine - a suitable small machine would cost less than £20. But when her birthday came she was presented instead with a much bigger version, costing more than seven times as much and more appropriate for polishing a table than a trinket! Of course it has never even been taken out of its box. Louise’s mother asked for a short rain jacket for her birthday. But Louise’s father decided that a bigger full-length coat would be much better. When Louise tried to tell him that this wasn’t what her mother wanted, it just resulted in a row with her Dad, who went ahead and bought what he wanted to buy anyway, and of course her Mum didn’t get what she wanted. On another occasion her Mum and Dad were out together when they saw and admired a painting, which featured a swan. Mum said she would really like that as a gift - but when the big day came, she was presented with a much bigger picture, featuring a whole family of swans in a landscape with a water mill etc. But of course that wasn’t the picture that she had liked so much when she saw it - and he was even there with her at the time! Obviously Dad thought that if one swan was desirable, many more swans MUST be much better. I’m still laughing about that. Honestly, if someone tells you exactly what they would like as a gift - just get that for them! How hard can it be? Sorry I only have a Christmas present picture to add! All rights reserved. © Text and image copyright Fleur 2022.