How to Annoy Your Friends and Relatives On Christmas

This is the time of year when you sometimes find yourself buying gifts for children who are not your own. Maybe you need to pick something out for a niece, nephew, grandchild, or your friend’s kids.

There are two ways to approach this: you can call up and ask what would be nice for the little ones or go out and find something that looks fun, useful, or educational. But there’s also a third way, a more subversive move that allows you to do something mildly devious without getting in trouble: go out and buy the loudest toy you can find.

This is an especially good move if you find someone (or their children) a little aggravating. It’s not just Christmas, it’s payback time.

chainsawBecause I’m all about being helpful, here is a list of 2009’s loudest toys issued by the Sight & Hearing Association of St. Paul, Minnesota. I think they provide this information so you can avoid the products, not seek them out. The noisiest toy they list is the Marvel Iron Man Mobile Headquarters —but I’m partial to the Black & Decker Junior Chainsaw. Imagine the fun the little tots will have pretending to cut down trees on Christmas Day.

You may also want to look for this item named in the NY Public Interest Group’s Trouble In Toyland report: Mattel’s Secret Saturdays Cryptid Claw. I’m not sure what it does, but as long as it’s noisy, it’s perfect.

There is nothing sweeter than the look on the face of a child making a hellish racket with a new toy. And if you’re lucky you may still be able to hear it as you head down the front walk to your car.

8 thoughts on “How to Annoy Your Friends and Relatives On Christmas

  1. When I was 6 my dad got me a set of toy drums.

    About halfway thru Christmas morning, he came to understand his error.

    His solution?

    “Hey Kid, why not look inside the drum to see what makes the noise?”

  2. A smaller Stihl chainsaw could be started by a six-year old, and really liven things up. Film it for “SAW 9 – A Christmas Story”.

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