Give your wife a saucepan instead of a lovely necklace for her birthday and chances are she’ll belt you around the face with it. Or so you’d think – but research released in August 2009 reveals that practical present-giving is on the up amongst couples whilst romantic gifts are on the way out.
Bye bye bracelets, so long eternity rings. So much for diamonds being forever; if the song was written now, it would go: “iPods are for a couple of years”. Why do these things always break when the warranty’s just run out? Still, today’s lovers don’t seem too concerned, with the MP3 players joined by books and DVDs as popular yet useful gifts.
Apparently spouses and partners across the country now spend an average of £196.47 on each other at birthdays and Christmas, compared with about £230 20 years ago. Of course 20 years ago £230 would have got you a slap-up meal, a night in a hotel and a new outfit all with change left over for the bus home.
As Groucho Marx once said: “There’s no time like the present; there’s no present like the time.” Well, Marxism has truly arrived, because we’d rather give each other egg timers than earrings.
Tags: birthday gifts, christmas gifts, gift giving, gifts, practical gifts, romantic gifts