Dear Santa: Send Lawyers, Guns & Money

Well, it's that time of year again: that magical season when we celebrate the birth of someone whose name, apparently, is "Holiday."

But that's not really important. The magic of Christmas is in finding a gift that's at least a buck more expensive than that bobo gift your co-worker got you last year.

And as a public service, our staff is here to help, even though, like public service, our staff doesn't actually exist!

So without further ado, our staff (shut up) presents our (my) reviews of this year's hottest holiday gift ideas!

• For the reader: Barbara Bush's "Why Sarah Palin Had To Leave Idaho"

• The Enough Already Corporation introduces a TIVO-like TV recorder that will zoom past bone-care ads where Sally Field obsesses about having to choke down a whole pill every day. This invention may, in our avuncular opinion, deserve a Nobel Prize.

• Sadly (but not surprisingly), the Snuggie is back, and back with a vengeance. The Snuggie, of course, is that androgynous A-line couch-wear that, when donned in private, turns the wearer into a grinning idiot, like Jack Nicholson in the good Batman movie. It gets worse. Occasionally, an entire group of Snuggie-cloaked people will appear in public, in the same place and at the same time, all mathematical probabilities notwithstanding. If any unwitting eyewitness manages to survive all the Snug-induced grinning, they'll likely not survive the orgiastic group dancing that follows. (Note: Snuggie devotees tend to frequent sports events involving young children, and during this festive season, I should move away from that joke right this minute.)

• For the reader: Rahm Emanuel's "A Sale of Two Cities"

• Debuting this year in the Christmas gift category is medical supplier Rear Echelon Orthotics, who offer a handy workplace device that will analyze whether someone in the office cafeteria is offering you additional dietary fiber for some weird, self-serving purpose, or simply because they really like you. (avuncular non-threatening Indian spokesman not included)

• Tech giant Huge Lit Packers has a new remote-access device that seems to work like this: when you press a button, a large chunk of land detaches itself from the mainland, travels through the tropics, dashes through the Arctic, snakes its way up an urban river channel, slides through a business district, and slams into an office building, causing a color document to get printed. (Inside the office building, no one notices when a foreign land mass crashes into their midtown superstructure. Maybe it's the offices of the FAA.)

• For the reader: Glenn Beck's "A Book of Stuff I Thought Up Since Last Week's Book"

• The makers of CLR, everyone's favorite household miracle cleaner, present CPR! CPR: a fast-acting powerful neurotoxin: simply drink one cup of CPR and never worry about cleaning again! Now in lemon-lime! (Last Will & Testament not included. Last rites and avuncular priest sold separately.)

• For the reader: "Jane Eyre Gets Regular" (Rochester discovers that his bitter, arson-leaning wife had gout. Plus, she's dead, which knocks down several "Wonder if Jane's busy?" bowling pins. He agrees to marry Jane, but only if she will begin a regimen of Bifidus Regularis and Sally Field-endorsed pro-biotics.)

• The popular board game "Where's Waldo?" gets a new treatment with "Where's Wadi?" Hilarity ensues as politically-hamstrung UN inspectors try to locate arms dealers before the (included) Mayan Calendar timer goes "Boom!" Fun for the whole family! And the "Where's Wadi" Bonus Round is sure to be a hit at frat house New Year's Eve parties! Simply attach the two exposed wire leads (included) to any standard car battery, start the Mayan timer, and hunt, hunt, hunt! But hurry! (Battery not included. If the timer expires, some reassembly may be required.)

So, happy shopping! And may I mention that I need a new putter, I love power tools, and I'm unimaginably shallow, self-centered and stupid!

Just like every other male in television ads!