Birthdays are a lesson in opportunity cost

So it was my birthday recently. My wish list is so long I'd be too embarrassed to use the wish list gadget and put it in the margin. That and the fact that there wouldn't be enough margin for the whole thing. So when it comes around to that once a year event when your friends are obligated to chip in for a present, there comes the inevitable question, "Sowhaddyawant for your birthday?"

At which point I have to thumb through the index of all the things I want, ordered by period-in-my-life (Barbie dolls through to puppies), sometimes simply just by period (chocolate, and a large box of tissues through to padded cell and straight jacket), and then cross-referenced by degrees of practicality through to straight out space-tourist-scale extravagance, and then reign it all back in with a huge piece of Asian upbringing and mumble, "Er, I don't know...Seriously, I really have no idea. It's not a big deal anyway."

So after a massive meal of (more) barbecue last weekend, I was kindly given the Complete Collection of Calvin and Hobbes to truck home. Weng sacrificed his gift idea to our friends (because I'd already twisted his arm into buying me a very specific bracelet) so Tish could wield his Amazon Prime wand and get the 30 tonne literary marvel delivered to his suburbian mansion.

It is terrific! I don't use that word often, but it seems fitting somehow, given the gravitas of everything Calvin and Hobbes represents to the world of comic writing. It also has family heirloom written all over it - one for each of you, Flopsy, Mopsy, and Jo. (My dogs, not my kids.)