Holiday Post 2009: You are still NOT done shopping?

It is a week before Christmas. This is the last weekend to get your holiday shopping done. If you are shopping online, you better hop to it, and you are going to have to use expedited shipping by now. In case any of my three readers are not done with their shopping yet, or they need a few ideas, here is a list of links and ideas for possible gifts. Now come on, get on with it. The American economy is depending on you to go out and spend so it can get the heck out of the recession by keeping more people in the recession when they shop too much. I know, I know, that came out a bit too cynical on my part. So, let me help out with the following:

• Maybe you have friends that spend a little too much time online. Or maybe you spend a little too much time blogging, on Facebook, so on. Mashable has put together a list of "10 Great Digital Gifts for Social Media Lovers." This is basically a list of subscriptions and gift cards to online services that social media users would probably appreciate. From music to gadgets, you are bound to find something. Mashable also has a list of places where you can get "10 Unique Gifts You Can Make With Help from the Web." This is basically a list of places where you can, with some input on your part, create things like photo albums, scrapbooks, and even your own brand of cereal.
  
• Maybe you are pretty good with your hands and inclined to making things yourself. Why not try to make one of these "DIY Gift Ideas" for your friends and family. Some of these do take a bit more work than others, but they might be well worth it. Found on Lifehacker.
  
• Here is a list of "12 Thoughtful Christmas Gifts That Are Better Than 'Expensive' Ones." The list combines DIY things with smaller thoughtful things like a well selected gift card or the right movie. Read on to find out more. From BillShrink blog.
  
• For the wine enthusiast, a good bottle of wine is always appreciated. However, the wine lover in your life may also appreciate wine related gifts. Cheap Fun Wines comes to the rescue with their "Holiday Gift Guide 2009."
• Would you like to give something unique, practical, and/or useful? GovGab has some suggestions of "Gifts for the Person With Everything." I particularly like this post because it is suggesting practical things that we don't often think about. Jess, the blogger, is linking to a FEMA gift ideas list. FEMA you say? Yes, this deals with emergency preparedness. For example, you can get your friends an emergency car kit, or one of those NOAA weather radios, you know, the one you keep saying you are meaning to get? Maybe while you are it, get two, so you can get one for yourself. I got jumper cables one year from my in-laws. Now, you may laugh at that, but those jumper cables have gotten me out of a bind once or twice. And they are nice long ones too, so you can have one car parked behind the other one and still run the cable. It's the kind of thing you might not get for yourself, or you may not think about, but boy are you glad to have it.
  
• A lot of people go the easy route and get gift cards. Gift cards remain a popular item, especially if you happen to get them one for a place you know they'll like, like gift cards to the bookstore for me. If you go this route, do consider being an informed shopper. The FTC (Federal Trade Commission) has put out a small consumer alert guide on "Buying, Giving, and Using Gift Cards." Do yourself a favor and take a minute to read it.
• Are you trying to be socially responsible in your shopping? Yes, I know this can be a challenge. You can go to Responsible Shopper and look up companies to see their records in terms of impact on human rights, social responsibility, and environmental issues.
• If you are buying toys, you may be interested in the "Trouble in Toyland" safety report (Link to the site. You can find the report itself and other interactive tools there). The report is made by the U.S. PIRG ( U.S. Public Interest Research Group).
• Did you get stuck having to do one of those "Secret Santa" exchanges at your workplace? I personally hated those. So if you need some ideas, Esquire is presenting Secret Santa gift ideas that are $30 bucks or so. They also have a list of "Worst Gifts on Earth," some of which I find pretty amusing, and there is at least one that I would not dare give my better half (and she is fairly open-minded. No, I am not telling you which).
• Now, you could give one of those universal remote controls as a gift, especially if the person in question watches a lot of TV, movies, so on. But let's be honest: a lot of the stuff on TV is crap. I am not going to sugar coated; it is right down horrible. So, why not amuse someone who feels the same by giving them this pistol shaped remote control. Let them shoot at the TV for a change without actually breaking the TV set. Found at Asylum.
• And how about soap? There is another thing that everyone needs at one point or another. Let's be honest though. Those basket sets you get at the big box retailer just don't quite cut it. So, why not try one of these unusual soaps? Found at Mental Floss blog.
• Now, in the end, I know the economy may be tight for a lot of you. Many may not be able to afford a gift. Maybe all you can do is send a nice card, and that is cool too. To help out, here are some holiday cards with a recession twist. Yes, apparently the new business in greeting cards is cards with sympathy feelings related to the economic recession. Found the story at Bizmology.

The adult section.

The next set of links are for adults. If you are easily offended, do not like sexually explicit items, or are just squeamish, you can stop reading right now. I am perfectly cool with that since I understand a few people may be more reserved. Just don't say I did not warn you.

If on the other hand, you have someone nice in your life (or more than one, or none at all, and you wish to be nice to yourself), and you want a little sexy fun, then read on. Here are some gift ideas for the bedroom (and the kitchen, and the living room, and. . . well, you get the idea).

• Fleshbot has put out a small holiday gift guide for 2009. And I do mean small, since it only has 6 items on it, but they are some very interesting items. If you run a search on the site, you can get their gift guides for previous years too for more ideas.
  
• The online store Babeland has a holiday guide for toys and so on. Or you can try Blowfish. A couple of reputable adult bloggers mention these in their blogs, so that gives me some extra reason to mention them here. For the obligatory FCC disclosure: No, I do not work for them nor do I receive any compensation, swag, neither did I sleep with anyone, nor get taken out for lunch, etc.
  
• Now, if you have gone shopping for sex toys, you know that some of them can be a little pricey. You can look at it this way: you either buy something cheap that you will have to replace soon, or you spend a bit more on something that will last you and that your partner and you will actually enjoy. But if the budget is a little tight, and I do understand the economy is not so good right about now, fear not. The nice ladies Em and Lo have put together a very good "Holiday Gift Guide for Broke Perverts." Now before you go elsewhere, hear me out. There are some nice items here from toys to candles to bubble bath. After all, as Em and Lo point out, "not all of us can afford to buy our favorite girl (or your favorite perv in life) a $175 Swarovski-crystal-encrusted vibrator with a pink feather tail on a silver stand. . . ." I know I'd love to buy it for the love of my life, but I am only a librarian (and thank the deity of your choice she understands that).
  
• If you are a little shy and don't want to go to an actual "adult" site, the online directory About.com actually has some information including a "Luxury Sex Toy Christmas Gifts for the Holidays" page and "Sexy Stocking Stuffer Gifts for the Holidays." Sure, you still have to follow the links to the actual stores to buy, but you get some nice descriptions to give you a good idea.
  
• And here is the lesson of the day for me. I am sure my readers have seen all sorts of comparison sites, you know, the sites you use to compare prices on products. You type in your product and get pricing from various retailers so you can compare. Well, I just discovered there is such a site for sex toys too. Now you can go to Sexy Toy Rates and do comparison shopping on your adult toy needs. You can search by category or type something in the search box. Now, I give readers the caveat: do compare, but don't automatically settle for the cheapest.
  
• And I have to throw something in for readers. As my three readers might know, I do read manga. Some of it does have adult themes, but no, not all manga does. If you want to get a sense of manga's more sensual side, here is a small "Great Manga Gift Guide" from Sadie Mattox at Extremely Graphic. Mattox is a librarian who "offers news, reviews and rants all while digging out from beneath a pile of graphic novel and manga."
• On a final note, if you want reviews of various products, The Kinky Librarian's blog is a good source. As I warned before, this is explicit. Now moving along, if you go to the blog, and set the category to "reviews" you will find both links to reviews and her own reviews. Nadia West, the blogger, does use a good amount of toys, and she reviews them honestly and candidly; if something does not work, she will say it. In other words, you can get the review from someone who actually plays with the toys (as opposed to just a corporate product description).