Best Present We Saw this Year

Hi Boingers!

We’re excited to be doing this and are honored to be included with such esteemed bloggers, both the regulars and the guests! We’ll be posting on a diversity of topics, with less sex and hip culture, and more kids’ books, dub music, skulls, jellyfish, and working toward sustainable living (or at least raising chickens and growing lettuce). Bruce is a political blog junkie and techno-gadget geek, while Shawn leans toward crafty blogs and irreverent humor, so be prepared for something like The Huffington Post meets Postcards From Yo Momma and Cool Tools paired with Design Sponge.

To start things off, we’d like to share the best Christmas present we’ve seen this year. Our friends Dave and Jen Sims got stuck in Thailand for an extra week after Thanksgiving due to the protests that closed the Bangkok airport. They finally made it home and just got these T-shirts as a gift:

The background image is a real photo of the protesters who took over the airport in Bangkok. You can read more about their experience here and here. Did you get any special gifts or see any that struck your fancy? Tell us about them in the Comments.

(Shawn Connally and Bruce Stewart are guest bloggers)

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sswaan

My parents gave me a book on migraines by Dr. Carolyn Bernstein, but my father was reluctant to do so, saying he thought I’d just be frustrated because I’d never be able to get an appointment with her. Turns out I already had one set up with her before I knew she was famous.
Mr_Staypuft

>I tried connecting it to StayPuft’s gaming blog link.. thinking like:
>he has custom 404 pages set up like interactive-fiction instructions.. cool.
>But his server is crappy.. not cool.
>

Oh dear, I’m sorry you had troubles.
I’m just on WordPress; it’s their server, not mine.

…I haven’t had problems before?

Hmm.. A bloghosting noob I am.
Anonymous

I got a remote-controlled zombie!
ShawnBruce

Geiger counters, babies, and zombies, oh my!
Seriously, these are a bunch of amazing gifts! I love the idea of a big stack of books and the socks, and @SSWAAN, I hope your appointment goes well! –Shawn
FoetusNail

Kaossilator! Lucky creature!
zuzu

Good to see the ol’ Kaos Pad has improved with time.

I should have asked Santa for a Yaesu VX-8R. It has Bluetooth for crying out loud; and supposedly a firmware hack will allow it to use a P25 chip. That would make tracking the FEMA camps in the post-econoclypse grim meathook future much easier.
flixchick

My sister is a chef, a total rock-star in the Anthony Bourdain vein but with great appreciation of cowboy culture and firearms. Our relationship is largely based on the preparation and consumption of tasty food so you’ll understand that I literally stopped breathing when I stumbled across a vintage set of Texas cookie cutters to give her. She was pretty geeked, too.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=1270071&l=83b1f&id=675798021
arkizzle

StayPuft..

Did you read the comment above mine? The one I was responding to?

It isn’t about your server!! WCC made a comment in the wrong thread, and I tried to parse that comment into the flow of this thread before I knew it was wrong, leading me to falsely believe WCC’s comment was about your blog/server.

Not so!

“I tried connecting it to StayPuft’s gaming blog link”
not
“I tried connecting {..} to StayPuft’s gaming blog link”.

The it refered to WCC’s misplaced comment.

Sorry for the confusion.
Xeni Jardin

That’s awesome. And hallo, guys, nice to have you on the blog! Here at the Boing Boing tv studios, we just unwrapped a late-arrival gift from our pal R. Stevens at dieselsweeties.com — a bunch of socks with space invaders and red pixel-robots on ‘em, stuffed inside a canvas shopping tote with a toaster popping up bacon. I will use said tote to purchase fruit at the farmer’s market down the street on Wednesday. And there you have it.
matt joyce

Best gift (in terms of coolness) I got this year is a weird one. My brother pulled this from an old nuclear bunker, and knowing my affinity for technology bound to get me in trouble… gave it to me.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/31040609@N02/3143292348/

Pretty awesome. Kinda trying to decide whether I should repair it or just hack it. Decisions decisions…
arkizzle

That was an abundant set of links Zu, a great read (and education) as always :)
bpratt

I got an igloo builder (OK, I got it for myself) – a neat gadget, it’s basically a form on the end of a stick that pivots and changes length to help you make a perfect circle and catenary arch of snow blocks. The kids and I built an igloo in the backyard (rare for Seattle!), and slept in it. Big fun – check out http://www.grandshelters.com for pix.
takeshi

Special, no. My Mom sent me $1,000, though, which she never does, in an attempt to get me to come home for a visit. I bought a guitar instead, because I hate traveling in the winter.

April it is.
arkizzle

Takeshi, that’s the Christmas spirit! :)
WeightedCompanionCube

I’m such a geek. I hear “free the Sims” and think about that maxis game where you can set the clown on fire.

Not that setting clowns on fire is a bad thing.
Takuan

@2, fix it and go “prospecting” in your town. Let us know what you find.
Mr_Staypuft

My best Christmas present this year?

1. I will now have to think about getting a *3 player* arcade cab
as my wife & I are expecting our first child!! Woohoo!

2. 2nd best Christmas present was something
that many BoingBoingers would appreciate…

http://justonemoregame.wordpress.com/2008/12/25/socks-for-christmas-epic-win/
Mr_Staypuft

Arkizzle,
Thanks for clearing that up.

Heh, fancy that, confusion in a text-only medium. ;-)

Now, back to the “presents” discussion…
WeightedCompanionCube

I can get the occasional page to load, but usually I get the following:

Firefox can’t establish a connection to the server…
Â IN A VAN…
Â Â DOWN BY THE RIVER!
Anonymous

Korg Kaossilator
http://www.korgkaossilator.com/
arkizzle

StayPuft, congrats.
WeightedCompanionCube

Hah, I’m all for surreal commenting tonight, but that was supposed to be on the Hobo Stripper story. I have no idea why it went back to this page when I hit the “return to story” link.

Unpublish? danke!
arkizzle

WCC@11, I was so lost.

I tried connecting it to StayPuft’s gaming blog link.. thinking like: oh, so he has custom 404 pages set up like interactive-fiction instructions.. cool. But his server is crappy.. not cool.

I need to go outside.
FoetusNail

My wife bought seven boks at the library thrift shop for less than $20, all of them in excellent condition. The fact that most people never read the books given as gifts is great for me.

Flags of Our Fathers
The Greatest Generation
The Greatest Generation Speaks
The WAL-MART Effect
Connections (yes, from Burke with dust jacket)
The History of Pi (his preface to the third edition is a hoot)
and a DK book about aircraft for the oldest and me
zuzu

Weâ€™ll be posting on a diversity of topics, with less sex and hip culture

Crap, looks like I’m out. :/

But who knows, maybe something will catch my eye anyway. And maybe someday Shane Smith from Vice / VBS.tv can guest blog about only about hip new cyborg drug hackers having orgies on Sealand, or something. Making a well-rounded BoingBoing. ^_^
littlerunninggag

The Artificial Intelligence freedom movement begins.