Father's Day without the card

Tomorrow is Father's Day and I've managed to dodge the bullet for another year and give him something I think he'll actually like. It is always, to be honest, a pain in the ass to find something for my parents. Dad isn't quite as bad as mom, but he has his moments. Thankfully, he's acquired a travelling bug in the past five years. So travel books, equipment, clothing, etc have been a nice fallback the last few years.

I'm also trying to resist the urge to shower him with rocks (ie, some of the amazing, and astonishingly reasonably priced, sculpture you can buy here). Then again, his birthday is next month so there is always the possibility of more rocks. Another nice thing....I have money. It's the first time in my life I've really not had to worry about money. So I can actually buy my mother and father decent gifts. I like being able to spend on them and not worry a lot about it. Mom is still happy with what she got last year for her Christmas/birthday gift. I find that while buying for my mom is hard, gold normally puts a smile on her face.

And no, I'm not worried about him finding out. While my father is a good guy with many abilities and I owe him a lot, one of his talents and abilities doesn't include anything in the way of computer skills. So unless one of you rat me out, he'll never know.

Anyway, I do have a gripe about Father's Day. While dad got his gift on Wednesday (that was impressive speed on Chapters part, since I ordered it last Saturday) he won't be getting a card. I normally do try and buy cards for occasions like this. And I always try to buy funny ones because I'm sure no one actually reads the cards with poetic verses. At least I don't. So if you ever sent me one, thanks, but odds are it went unread. I just find them boring and a bit pretencious.

But a funny card...You know people are going to read it and hopefully get a chuckle out of it. It's the only way I can justify spending a ridiculous amount of money on something people will spend 30 seconds with.

The problem is, there are four kinds of cards that you can buy for your dad on Father's Day, his birthday, Christmas or whatever occasions. And these are the percentages of their availability.

1. A card with a fart joke involving your dad - 33%
2. A card with a golf joke involving your dad - 33%
3. A card about his inability/fixation with tools - 33%
4. Anything else - 1%

I consider fart jokes to be about one of the lowest forms of humour around, my dad doesn't golf and tools are just one of those things that exist and he uses if he has to. So this makes getting a decent card an annual challenge that I dread. This year, I just bailed. The card selection in Iqaluit is even more limited than what you would find in St. John's. So I'm using the distance as an excuse.

I'm sure he won't mind. And hopefully he'll like the gift.