I remember hearing when I was younger the advice, "Buy someone a gift you'd want for yourself." I'm guessing it's an injunction to not be cheap, but simultaneously it makes no goddamned sense. Next month is my mother's birthday, my father's birthday, and Father's Day, and if I bought gifts I'd want for myself for them, they would receive video games and manga. I guess that's the difficulty of gift-giving: You have to enter someone else's mind, and then try to figure out if they have it already. I know perfectly well what many of my friends' tastes are like, but I have no idea whether or not they've already acquired what I'm considering.

I've examined the evidence and I've looked at the arguments, and I see I have no choice: I'm going to take up crocheting. There's too many cute things I can make.