My husband was browsing in the appliance department of a large downtown store when he ran into his friend Walt Stokums. Walt was gazing bleary-eyed at a row of steam irons.
"Howdy, Walt!" Dave slapped him on the back. "Where's Connie?"
"Oh, she stayed home with the kids, so I could shop for her birthday present," Walt confided, offering Dave a clammy handshake.
"Gonna' surprise the little woman with a new iron?" Dave asked.
"Well, I don't know," Walt's voice trembled. "Connie is so fussy. She always returns whatever I pick out. And if I get her anything useful, she thinks I'm making a statement about her housekeeping."
"You could get her something frivolous--like a new negligee," Dave winked.
"I tried that last year, but she exchanged it for a carpet sweeper."
"What about books?"
"Afraid not. I'd have to bribe someone from Harlequin to smuggle a new potboiler off the press before the ink was dry. Otherwise, she'd already have it."
"Doesn't she ever read anything else?'
"Only self-help books on home and time management. But I know better than to give her one of those. She already has a schedule on the bathroom mirror--five minutes is all I get to shower, dry my hair, and shave. And if I leave lather in the sink, I lose thirty-five seconds of my breakfast time."
"Why don't you just take her out to dinner?" Dave got practical.
"No way! Connie has been on a diet since she was born. Two years ago, I thought I had it made when I gave her a digital bathroom scale, but that really backfired. For the next six months, we had nothing but green salad and Diet Coke for supper every night."
Walt's eyes were beginning to look like marbles, and he began to hyperventilate."
"Maybe you'd better come over here and sit down for a minute." With the help of an eavesdropping clerk, Dave settled the distraught man in a straight-backed chair.
"Poor devil," my husband said to the clerk, there's got to be some way we can help."
In reply, the clerk leaned over and whispered something.
"I've got it!" Dave shouted, amazed that what seemed to be the perfect solution could be presented in just three words. "A gift certificate, Walt. You can give Connie a gift certificate. Then she can get herself something she really wants!"
Walt sadly shook his head. "That's exactly why I'm here. I gave her a gift certificate this morning, and she sent me back with it. She wants me to use it on something to surprise her."
