Gifts for the Parent Who's Disappointed in You

It’s easy to buy a gift for the parent who likes you. A mom or dad who adores you will likely adore anything you get them—no matter how shitty the gift is—simply because it came from their beloved child. A far greater challenge is finding the perfect gift for the parent who is actively disappointed in you and the way…
Gifts For the Oblivious Babies In Your Life
Babies and small children, unfortunately, are ill-equipped to fully appreciate Christmas. Their little hands can’t hold things, nor can they grasp the concept of gifts. They’re built that way, and it’s no one’s fault. While their lack of comprehension doesn’t render them completely useless, it does make it hard to…
Gifts for the Athlete Who Cannot Be Contained By a Gym
I hate the gym. Hate is, perhaps, a strong word, but I certainly and adamantly prefer not to be inside one. Unless a person is a fan of group fitness classes, they’re basically misery caves, especially in the winter— sweaty, air saturated with aspirated moisture from the pores of other humans, exertion sounds,…
Gifts for the Spooky Adult
Somewhere in the tangles of your friend group or your family tree, there is a spooky person. As a teenager they liked — melodramatically loved, perhaps — Tim Burton; as an adult, their tastes hew to Nick Cave, the Criterion collection, and probably stuff with owls on it. It either strikes you as adorable or incredibly…
Gifts for the Murderous Fashion Fiend
From Zoolander to The Devil Wears Prada, pop culture has cast hardcore fashion people as sadistic, unapologetic, demanding monsters. While that’s not totally true overall, they can be awfully hard to please during the gifting season, if only because they have everything and are over it. If you can’t afford to buy out…
Gifts for the Aspirational Sleeper
Sleeping is a wonderful activity, and one of my personal favorites. My editor Erin recently described me as “a sloth trying to accomplish a series of tasks,” which I found very apt and also upsetting. While most healthy adult Americans consider themselves lucky to reach 8 hours, I am always striving for more, more,…
Gifts for the Actively Relaxed Stoner
In a piece towards which I felt all the traditional stages of love—surprise, attraction, anger, denial, tentativeness, renewal and then commitment—Mattathias Schwartz, for the New York Times Magazine, wrote a Letter of Recommendation for a vape.
Gifts for People Who Refuse to Embrace New Technology

My dear mom is in possession of a cellular phone—let's call it an iPhone—and yet you would not know it because she never picks up the cellular phone and because she frequently forgets the cellular phone at home. Just a couple weeks ago, she said something along the lines of, "What do I need a phone for?"
Gifts for the Card-Carrying Man-Hater
Misandry: so hot right now. But man-hatery is also timeless and classic: chic as an elegant chignon bun, tough as a steel-toe boot. Think, if you will, of a stunning black dress, but with a highly venomous snake coiled around the waist, trained to sink its fangs into the neck of any motherfucker who steps to you.…
The Clean Person Holiday Gift Guide 2013
Jolie Kerr is a cleaning expert and advice columnist. This holiday season she's got gift ideas for the clean, or not-so-clean, person in your life. Are you dirty? Email her.
Reader Gift Guide: What Are You Getting Your BFF This Year?
The holidays are the only one time of the year when you can drop all those no let me pay, no really, I got it this time pretensions with your nearest and dearest and get them a gift that truly says 'I'm glad I didn't believe to all that shitty gossip about you that I spread back in the eighth grade because you are…
Reader Gift Guide: What Are You Getting Your Lov-ah This Year?
This time Thursday you'll likely be sitting down with a heaping pile of food with some people you want to kill even though you have the same genes. But maybe you'll be sitting down with people you want to kill that you don't have the same genes as because they're your significant other's family. Despite that…
Reader Gift Guide: What Are You Getting Your Mom This Holiday Season?
It's November 25 — exactly one month until Christmas, exactly one month to watch Elf on repeat — and even if you think the gift-giving season shouldn't officially start until the turkey dinner has been reduced to leftovers, it's already happening. Black Friday and Cyber Monday — why even wait for those? Everyone's got…
