Baby'$ Holiday Li$t

Yesterday’s newspaper had an article on Presents for Baby’s First Holiday, containing the most incredible ideas for gifts you can buy for the one-and-under set.

Well, actually it was about items that other people might buy, because I didn’t see anything in which we would be willing to invest our hard-earned money. And I don’t use the term “invest” lightly.

As an example, let’s consider the hooded sweatshirt they recommended. First of all, just to set you persons of a certain age straight, these are no longer called “sweatshirts” – they are now called “hoodies.” I can only guess that the upscale venders of these items are trying to emphasis the “hood” part and de-emphasize the “sweat” part.

And why is that? Because the particular sweater they are selling is a cashmere hoody that sells for $96.95. For babies, let me remind you

Did you just gasp or laugh? Good. It’s always nice to know that my readers are normal people with a firm grasp on reality.

In order to be fair to the writer of this holiday sales piece, there was a more affordable item on baby’s holiday list: a handmade stick horse made by artisans in Brazil. If you noted the word “artisan” in the copy you have a clue about what is coming. Yes, the price of this dowel with an all knitted head on top is $44.00.

I can see several problems with this particular item – aside from the price. A child who is one-or-under will not be able to play with this item; they will be learning to walk and balance, not straddle a stick and gallop. Older siblings who are old enough to ride the horsie (after they take it away from the baby) will be more inclined to use it as a weapon to hit other children – including the one year old who is cutting into their haul of presents.

There is also a $750.00 wooden-looking seesaw. I just can’t make myself go further into this one. Buy the kid a good long-term certificate of deposit.

Trying to be fair I considered whether this article was just misplaced; maybe it should have been in The New York Times, a newspaper with upscale demographics sold to people who live in and around New York City and who, therefore, have no idea what is going on in the real world. But I couldn’t convince myself of this either as I know a number of perfectly normal people who receive and sometimes actually read the NYT. [See, I even know enough to refer to it by its initials.]

The only alternative I have is to give the writer credit for a tongue-in-cheek article that was very well done, because at first I thought he was serious.

Right?