Online Shopping Is The Worst

It’s that time of the year when I am desperate for gift ideas that will dazzle my loved ones, yet my brain simply has no good ideas. So I turn to the internet to inspire me. There are gift guides galore, but honestly, they really don’t do much for me. I feel like they just keep suggesting the same basic gifts. A toolkit for Dad, a soft blanket for Mom…boring! Most people already have these things anyway. And no one needs four Bluetooth speakers.

And then sometimes, by some miracle, a great idea is had. That could be a cool gift, I’d think. So I look into my options for buying. Have you ever clicked the Shopping tab on Google? It’s garbage. A useless tool unless you’re someone with money to blow and no sense of general online safety. It’s no wonder that we’re all just turning to Amazon to shop.

Anyway, as a Canadian, ideally I’d like to buy online from businesses in or close to Canada. Not for patriotic reasons, though. I just hate dealing with currency conversions and ridiculous shipping fees. So when possible, I look for shopping alternatives closer to home. Often, this is a challenge.

The other thing that’s been driving me crazy when it comes to online shopping is the huge increase in drop-shipped or cheap mass-market products being sold as unique, hand-made items. I’ll browse Etsy for creative gift ideas, and just see the same products over and over that clearly aren’t handmade or from an honest small business. Shopping online nowadays feels like I’m just giving money to the scammer with the best SEO, and I should be grateful as long as get something more or less like what I expect.

Ideally, I’d like to shop in stores in real life. But stores just seem to have the basic stuff. No personalization, no unique things, just the typical things you expect in each store. And that’s fine. At least there are no shipping fees or misunderstandings about what you’re getting. That’s why I only shop for clothes in physical stores. I want to touch the fabric and try it on.

The other perk to IRL shopping is you have a better idea of prices. I know that if I go into a Walmart, I’m going to get lower prices (and sometimes lower-quality products) than if I went into an Eddie Bauer, for example. And while that can be true for online shopping too, it only works if you’re already familiar with either the brand or the product. So when you’re like me and you’re scrolling through gift guide after gift guide, sometimes you’re hit with just some crazy prices. $150 for a luxury chess set or $300 for a pair of silk pajamas…like, I know there are fancy things in the world that some people are happy to buy, but I’d argue that the average person, especially with our economy being what it is, is not looking for gift ideas in such extreme price ranges. Scrolling through things like that is just a waste of time, in my opinion, and it frustrates me.

I love Christmas. I like getting gifts. I love finding great gifts for people on my list. I just wish it were easier. I wish online shopping was better. I know I should be lucky that no one I’m shopping for needs anything and I can instead buy fun, goofy things to delight them while living in this culture of consumerism, but the whole process just really takes a mental toll on me, and I find myself looking less forward to it each year.

To all those also deep in the trenches of holiday shopping, I wish you the best. Let me know if you find any cool gift ideas. What’s something you once received as a gift that you loved?

That’s all for now!

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Random Ramblings Because I Have Nothing Else To Say

It’s been a while since I’ve found myself needing a blog post to go up and having nothing ready. Usually I at least have some half-written draft I can finish and publish. Sometimes I have an idea that I have time to flesh out fully. But this week, I have nothing. And you know what? That’s okay. For now. I hope it’s just a temporary outage.

And since I didn’t want to just skip a week, I figured I’d throw some word vomit down and see where that takes me. I don’t often get to just ramble because I usually have some specific direction I take my posts.

So what’s new with me? Not much. I did just come back from a long weekend up in Tobermory, though. Some friends and I rented a little cabin for a few days and had a lot of fun going on hikes and ‘roughing’ it. We had great weather for September. There were five of us, and it’s really weird to think that this friend group came together during the pandemic. I genuinely didn’t know two of them a few years ago, and now they’re some of the most important people to me. I really, really hope we’re able to maintain this friendship down the line as our lives get busy. We’re all the same breed of silly, and that’s special, I think.

The Grotto

View from the Devil’s Monument loop hike

I was never someone who had a lot of true friends, and for a while that was fine because I filled my time with TV shows and fandom and social media. I was content arranging my life around that. I remember a period in university where I genuinely had six or seven TV shows to watch on a Tuesday night alone. I loved it. I made sure homework and dinner were done by 8pm so I could dive into that. But things are different now. I’ve definitely aged out of fandom culture to some extent, but I also am not as enthralled and devoted to much anymore. I’m not even watching six shows a week, never mind one day. Has my taste evolved or has TV just gotten worse? Probably both.

And hey, speaking of TV, this is some wild strike going on, eh? I am definitely on the side of the writers and actors here. It’s ridiculous that networks and companies were able to even run the way they were. Capitalism is truly a disease. I hope this strike ends soon and marks the start of a real positive change in the industry.

I don’t want to start moaning about how unfair the world is now, so here’s a new topic: my brother’s birthday is coming up soon, and I don’t know what to get him. What would the mid-20’s males in your life like to receive? I don’t think I’m a bad gift giver, but I want to give gifts that people like getting. My parents like to remind us that “it’s a blessing to not need anything” which is true but doesn’t help me when I’m on page 7 of Google results for gift ideas and still have nothing. I don’t think I’m the easiest to buy for either, though.

My boyfriend and I have agreed so far (aka I made him agree to it) that we not get each other Valentine’s or anniversary gifts. We can go out for dinner or do something together, but I don’t want him buying me something because he feels like he has to, as such holidays often promote. I don’t need anything. And I don’t enjoy the pressure of having to find a perfect gift either. So no.

Maybe because I was thinking about relationships just now, but a show popped into my mind and I realized that I have never mentioned it on my blog. Farming For Love. It’s a new Canadian show, but it’s a variation of a worldwide franchise with the same concept: a dating show trying to find partners for average farmers. I’m not usually one to watch dating shows, but since my boyfriend is from a more rural area and I joke about that a lot, it caught my eye. We binged it recently (shout out to Rogers Ignite) and were surprised at how entertaining it was for both of us. It’s just as goofy as any other dating show out there but seemed a bit less dramatic and staged than you’d expect. To my fellow Canadians looking for something to watch in place of the normal fall TV broadcasts, give Farming For Love a try.

All of the sudden, this post has gotten quite lengthy, so I’ll end it here. I had fun writing this, actually, and maybe I’ll do more posts like these. If you liked it. Tell me if you do. Either way, thanks for putting up with this in place of my normal, more focused content.

That’s all for now.

 

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I Don’t Know When To Use Gift Cards

I hoard gift cards. Unintentionally. But my wallet can be classified as a weapon of mass destruction if I carried them all around in there.

I just never know when to use them. I don’t want to just use them for the sake of using them. I always saw them as bonus money, for special reasons. Or ‘just in case’ funds, if I needed to buy something I didn’t want to pay for properly.

But if I’m buying something, I can pay for it properly. Thus, my gift cards sit aside, full.

Right before I started university in 2014, my godmother gave me a $100 gift card to Shoppers Drugmart (sort of like a CVS, for you Americans). I figured I’d use it eventually to get some toiletries or mascara when I run out. Shoppers isn’t really a place to go for fun shopping, so I saved it for a time when I needed something. I never used it. My godmother isn’t even alive anymore, but that gift card is.

I know I’m lucky and blessed to never have been in a scenario where a gift card is the only money I have. I know I’m lucky and blessed to have never urgently needed to buy something so outside of my budget. 

I like receiving gift cards. I like knowing that I have this special money ready for me to use when I feel like it. I just need to get better at feeling like it. For better or for worse, I’m not a treat yo’ self kind of person. Thank goodness gift cards usually don’t expire.

Because my other problem is that I simply forget I have them. Since I have such a hefty collection, I can’t carry them with me always, so I forget about them. Even if I do have them on me, I still forget sometimes. And of course I always remember about half an hour after the purchase has been made. 

How do you use gift cards? Do you go out of your way to treat yourself? Do you just use them at your earliest convenience? Do you hoard save them like me?

P.S. Mini Cineplex gift card rant. Cineplex only lets you use one gift card per transaction, so I have about 7 cineplex gift cards with like 5 or less dollars on them, and I can’t simply use them all up at once and get rid of them. I don’t go to Cineplex often, so this will likely continue to be a problem in my life.

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