Me vs. My Mom’s Boyfriend III: The Trilogy Fight For Getting My Mom The Perfect Birthday Gift
Today was my wonderful mother's birthday which means one thing and one thing only: the trilogy heavyweight matchup between myself and my mom's boyfriend with presents for her. Now why does this matter Hubbs? We don't care if you get her better gifts than him/vice versa. Completely fair, but the last two gift giving situations we've had we have gotten her the same exact fucking thing and the updates swept the nation. There's a reason you clicked on this blog.
So as a quick recap: Her last birthday in April I got her an Alexa and he got her a Google Home. Last Christmas, just a few months ago, we both got her identical 4k 65 inch TVs. I documented the whole crisis here and the eventual resolution here. The TLDR? I caved in like a bitch and returned my TV on Christmas Eve, getting her a nice big grill from Home Depot that she desperately needed instead. The only problem? Best Buy wouldn't accept the TV back that day because I returned it too quickly (ridiculous) and the grill was too big for my Acura. It was so unbelievably big that the employees helping it to my car laughed in my face for my gross miscalculation. I had to get an Uber XL to come pick it up and follow me home. I spent the whole day running around town spending money I didn't have to make this work for everyone. Way too many people cared about this story from the beginning, but at this point it's like Fury-Wilder. Gatti vs. Ward. Ali vs. Frazier. Today was the much anticipated trilogy fight.
Now flash back to about 10 days ago, I'm back at home in Jersey because of quarantine and I'm shopping online spending way too much money on random gifts. The moment I submit my order the horrifying thought pops in my head that I once again forgot to confront the boyfriend with what he got her ahead of time.
I immediately got a cold shiver down the back of my spine. No worse feeling. But what could I do? The order was submitted and judgement day was less than two weeks out. I had too much pride to ask what we got her. I also like chaos and really wanted to see if we were destined to do this for the rest of time. All I had left was prayer and hope: two things that generally fuck me in the face.
So over the last two weeks the packages arrived and were stacked up in my room. Every time I'd walk past the boyfriend I'd attempt to read his mind. The other day he even joked that we got the same thing, but I hadn't told him what I got so how could he know? What the fuck! This is no joking matter!
Now the difference between today's gifts and those in the past was that I didn't accept any hints from my mom about what she wanted. Nope, didn't want 'em. This was all creative me making the call. Some would say that's a horrible idea, but I went with my gut this time. In times of desperation we come up with our greatest ideas.
When it came to the gift giving I went first. If you recall during Christmas, the boyfriend gave his TV gift on CHRISTMAS EVE! What's the point of Christmas if we're giving our big gifts the whole fucking day before? No more of that. I put my foot down and installed the commandments of gift giving from that point forward.
This year I went big with two major home run hitting presents. I gave her a robot vacuum first and buddy let me tell ya she was stunned. She said she's wanted one forever but has just ignored it because of the inordinate price. Well, Eric has been saving money from not ordering food, going to bars, or gambling with the whole sports world shutdown so he's got a surplus of United States dollars to spend on the woman who brought him into this world. Robot vacuum it is. You hit start and this bad boy just goes to work. Honestly this thing is a PROBLEM and it could very well mean my eventual demise. It opens doors, it goes under beds, it's mission is to make the house spotless and to terrorize my dog. It probably has a weapons system that is unlockable. There is a brewing rivalry between my Shih Tzu and the robot. Man's best friend vs. the Machine. I've got the machine right now -750 to win before the 10th round.
My other gift was a goddamn laptop. My mom has never cared to spend money on herself and still uses my late dad's old laptop from work. This thing is ancient and needs to be charged at all times. It doesn't even have an HDMI port which seems impossible. Well, no more! She's got her own laptop to do all her work on and she couldn't be happier.
I absolutely nailed these gifts. And the best part? The boyfriend couldn't match me. We didn't get the same gift! I am out of this nightmare.
He went with gift cards, some makeup, and a one day fancy spa thingy. Listen bucko, my mom traps raccoons when she's bored. Dinosaur sized, mutated killer raccoons. She also has vertigo so massages don't work for her. There's no time for the spa and massages when you're always on the attack with the evil raccoons of the world. Swing and a miss while my home run ball is still going.
Night night. The trilogy goes to me via knockout. Stop the fight.