Miscellaneous
Internet Merch
5th December, 2025
You and your beloved probably have some internet-based creators you both enjoy. A YouTube series, or a podcast, maybe even a webcomic. Those creators probably have merch, and your recipient is predisposed to like it.
A couple of ours have books out this Christmas. Great Art Explained makes calmly insightful art videos, free of gurning and whats-up-guys. There’s a coffee table book with the same title.
Vintage Adult Magazines
8th November, 2021
This definitely isn’t a universal gift and is tough to find, but a vintage Playboy magazine is an excellent gift for the right person. For a start, there’s no way they own it already.
But mostly it’s a time capsule: the topics, the photography, the design, the adverts. The adverts! Reel-to-reel tape players, cigarettes, clock radios. And the quality of the writing might surprise you - the canard “I buy it for the articles” is rooted in truth. Just look at the list of contributors: Truman Capote, Philip K Dick, Dick Gregory, and Henry Miller. When you think “Playboy”, you probably don’t think “First person accounts of life in Iran”… but here we are.
A Bum Bag
4th November, 2021
Sure, they had a fashion resurgence a few years ago, but that’s not why it’s a great kid’s gift. There’s an age range - maybe 5 to 9 - when you get a taste for independence. A bum bag is its own private universe, big enough to fit everything you need to survive: your favourite small toy, a chocolate bar, £2.50 in pocket money, a pen, an optic wonder, and some string.