I think there's a missed opportunity in romance land, particulary in paranormal romance land, particularly in the lucrative gifting market.
I'm talking about anniversary gifts. You know how there's a chart of what gifts are symbolic of each year of marriage, and people can get downright goofy adhering to the suggested gifts? Like, say, my husband, who, for our tenth anniversary, wrapped my present in tin foil because the traditional gift was tin/aluminum. I should be thankful I didn't also get a tube of Reynolds wrap, too.
Some of the traditional lists I've seen stop usually at the 60th anniversary, known in some charts as the “diamond anniversary,” while the 75th is also the diamond anniversary. I myself am partial to the 48th US Modern anniversary, which is “Optical goods,” or the 44th, which is the ever-so-romantic “Groceries.” Nothing tops the 41st and 42nd anniversaries, though, which are “Land” followed by “Improved real estate,” because clearly, whoever bought the land last year did not know what they were doing, and they need another shot at that gift.
Also, how does one wrap groceries? Stick a bow on the bag?
Anyway, aside from wondering what possible gifts one might receive when the theme is “original poetry tribute,” and how many times the word “Nantucket” might be involved, I realized that these lists, the US traditional, UK traditional and US modern, are terribly inadequate.
What about the immortal couples?
I mean, come on. All these paranormal creatures living forever, having curtain-shredding orgasms and amassing pots of money, surely they run out of gift ideas after the 156th anniversary. What about them?
I think there should be a chart for the immortal anniversaries, for all those creatures who have neverending lifespans, and a lot of time to shop when they're not having orgasms, saving the world, and doing whatever else they do for eternity. I'm going to guess that they'd only count decades after the first century or so, so my chart just counts by tens.
100th | 10 Carat Diamond |
110th | Diamond mine preferably conflict-free |
120th | Country (not music, an actual country, preferably conflict-free) |
130th | A monkey (haven't you always wanted a monkey?) |
140th | 60 Minutes, the complete series on DVD |
150th | Beanie Babies. All of them. With tags! |
160th | The shroud of Turin, or a Dead Sea Scroll, your choice |
170th | Snow globe |
180th | Plutonium (Uranium is also acceptable) |
190th | Swiffer |
200th | A planet (Pluto doesn't count. It's not a planet anymore.) |
There, doesn't that just make the neverending future seem even more wonderful? What gifts would you suggest for the perpetual anniversary? I mean, it's eternity. There's always room for more stuff.
looking at Warrior Moon the designers are also all living in 1986. If puffy sleeves are the future, I’m not going.
“Time to retreat to a romance written many years ago that features offensive racist, classist, and sexist stereotypes: The Grand Sophy.”
Heaven knows, anti-semitism is so much more ‘comfortable’ than those icky homosectionals, right?
“any decision that appears to reverse progress against discrimination is viewed with alarm and, clearly from comments above, with unbridled antagonism. “
You say this like it’s a bad thing. Obviously you’re new around these parts.
“I don’t want to be made uncomfortable when I read a romance. I want to be made happy.”
And two people falling in love doesn’t make you happy because their genitalia is approximately similar? How can two men or two women falling in love make you unhappy, unless you are, in fact, a teeny bit of a nasty little bigot?
Well if it was my anniversary I’d want for our 100th the complete, in hardback, collection of Alfred Hitchcock & The Three Investigators.
http://www.threeinvestigatorsb…
I’ve seen the series for sale, complete, two times. Both times they were between $3,000 to $6,000 dollars.
Of course, I decided should I ever meet a man desperate enough to want to marry me, instead of a huge diamond ring, he can buy me a little $200 ring and those books.
And, for the 787th anniversary, you can give the the Swarovski toilet because 10 years of going side by side is more than enough…