For those who don’t know me very well.. I hate shopping … Don’t like to window shop.. don’t like to try on clothes.. don’t like to browse… I especially don’t like to do any of these activities in December. It has always been my goal to complete all Christmas shopping before the end of November. This allows me to enjoy the entertaining (drinking and eating) part of Christmas.. I usually succeed.

This weekend E and I went to Vancouver for the the family property AGM.. I went Christmas shopping with my girlfriend and he AGM’d.. I have a very limited budget because as you may have heard.. boat problems.. but still I love Christmas and I love to give my kids gifts…My girlfriend and I have been Christmas shopping together for years.. We have a system that works and we work very well as a team.. we split up at the entrance to the store.. grab things from our list and those we see on the others list. We manage to end up at the cashier with our combined lists achieved.. It is sheer brilliance.. We have great fun..

It is now Sunday night.. we started yesterday morning and I am finished.. I have pretty much everything on my list and it is all stored in her spare room. We will come back to town December 23rd in time to wrap and enjoy Christmas with no Christmas line ups.. December spent in peace and quiet on the island.

Tonight we ran into Wal-Mart for a few last minute stocking stuffers and to find an ice scraper for the boat windshield. Over the summer some of my island friends have shared their recipes with me.. I have to admit I have just been shoving them into a notebook. Tonight I thought it would be a good idea to pick up a recipe box. E, my girlfriend and I begin to search Wal-Mart for a recipe box.. There was none to be seen and we were tired and worn out.. I went to customer service to try to speed up the search. There was a woman standing in front of customer service at a very important looking podium. She looked to be in charge of the whole operation..

Me “Could you tell me where I could find a recipe box”

Boss Lady “Do you know the skew number?”

Me “No, I don’t. I thought you could just tell me where you keep them”

Boss Lady “We don’t have computers here. If you don’t know the skew number I can’t tell you where an item is kept.”

so I went over to Customer Service. There was a sweet young thing behind the counter.

Me “Could you tell me where I could find a recipe box?”

Sweet young thing “A what?”

Me “A recipe box. It’s a box, and you put recipes in it. You know, when you want to cook something you could pull out a recipe.”

Sweet young thing “Is it small?”

Me ” Yes it is the size of a recipe card.”

Sweet young thing picks up the phone and calls stationary.”Have you ever heard of an item called a recipe box? It is apparently a small box.”

Sweet young thing turns to me with the phone on her shoulder “Maam, they have one in the stationary on a lower shelf. It is made of cardboard and has a coil.”

Me. “That sounds like a book.”

I went over to stationary and sure enough there were four old-fashioned (apparently) recipe boxes. I cannot imagine what  sweet young thing would have thought if I told her my house was heated with wood which we chopped by hand or that we pumped our water from a well. I  paid for my recipe box and left the store.. Next November I will brave the new world again.