Once again, we present the annual Chanukah gift guide, which is the only gift guide that prides itself on the following principles three:
- It’s printed just a little too late for you to actually do anything useful with this information.
- It’s full of items that you can basically guarantee that your recipients do not already have, and
- They’re also items you would never in a million years want to keep for yourself.
Our goal, at the gift guide, is to remove some of your stress of the Yom Tov season by suggesting gifts that may instead transfer the stress to the lives of the people you’re giving them to.
And yes, we understand that not everyone does Chanukah presents. These are the perfect gifts for those people. Because how are they going to retaliate, huh? They already don’t give you presents!
For example, you can get someone Ear-Heating Headphones (Thanko, $67). This is a set of in-ear headphones that do not play music. Instead, they’re designed to heat up the inside of your ears, which would be very worrisome if you didn’t know that that’s what they were supposed to do.
I think maybe one reader in the entire world is saying, “Finally! Where have these been all my life?”
Apparently, according to the company, some people need the inside of their ears to be warm in order to fall asleep. And I understand that different people need different things, but as someone who keeps flipping my pillows all summer to find the cool side, there’s nothing I want more than an object at the side of my head acting as a warmer.
“But wait,” you’re saying. “Didn’t you write about a news story a couple of years ago wherein a man woke up one morning to find that he’d swallowed one of his ear buds in his sleep? Isn’t creating earbuds specifically to sleep in just asking for trouble?”
And the answer is “No, because these have a cord.” Or the answer is “Definitely yes, because these have a cord.”
I personally can’t wear in-ear headphones, because no matter what I do, they fall out. And I especially think these would, because I assume that heating up your ears only makes things more slippery in there. So I always use over-ear headphones. And it turns out the ones I have already keep my ears warm, despite not advertising as such. And the good news is that I’m generally not at risk of swallowing them!
These earbuds are also great if you want to listen in on people’s conversations and have them assume you’re listening to music.
Allow plenty of time for delivery, because the product has to come from Japan. The way you know it wasn’t made by English speakers is that it’s not called earmuff buds. Or heat phones.
And speaking of eavesdropping, that same company in Japan also makes a set of headphones that has the sound pointed away from your ears. That way, you can share your music with the tzibur, like those people do who drive around your neighborhood with their tunes blasting outside the car, or an SUV limo full of bochurim on Purim.
Supposedly, the idea behind the headphones, which are called Sounds Lives Stereo Earphone (Thanko, $7), is so you can hear outside sounds better without pulling out an earbud every few seconds and saying, “What?” in an annoyed tone that expresses your displeasure at people constantly talking to you while you’re hanging out near them with headphones in.
This way, no one will talk to you when your music is on, because they’ll be able to hear it.
The way you can tell that this product is not made by English speakers is that it’s called “Sounds Lives Stereo Earphones.” I don’t even know how to say that. Is it pronounced lives or lives? Neither way helps the name make sense.
Another product made by that same company is the Yubi Nobiiru, or Thumb Extender (Thanko, $14). This is a little hat that you wear over your thumb to extend its length a bit so you can reach greater distances on a touch screen device than your grandparents ever thought were possible. And so you won’t get as many stares, it’s colored to look like a thumb that one would use for magic tricks, that for some reason has a black touch-screen bubble on the front.
And if you need to blow your nose, presto! You can keep a handkerchief scrunched up inside.
You can also wear this thumb over your mittens so you can continue to use your device in the cold.
Also, if you’re washing dishes or cutting vegetables and your actual fingers are not going to work on the screen, you can just keep this at your side on the counter until someone walks into the kitchen and calls Hatzalah.
But as a gift in general, you can’t go wrong with phone accessories. Or maybe you can. For example, you can buy someone a Smart Spray (Tayos Inc., $10), which is a cellphone case with a built-in container on the back that can hold a couple of ounces of liquid, and has a small spray nozzle on top. You can fill this container with whatever liquid you might need at a moment’s notice in your day-to-day life out on the road, changing it by the day – pepper spray, sour candy spray, perfume, suntan lotion, hand sanitizer, window cleaner, bug spray, salad dressing, furniture polish, shirt starch, mayim acharonim, or a breath spray that tastes like one of the above – whichever one you used right before you put in the breath spray.
The possibilities are endless, as long as you wash it well in between!
That way, let’s say you C”V are getting mugged, you can whip out your phone, and rather than calling the cops, you can hold it up so he thinks you’re taking a video of him, but instead you give him a face full of salad dressing.
“Oh, that’s right. I brought lunch to work yesterday.”
Another good item for people who carry around a lot of stuff is the Swissdigital Neptune Massaging Backpack (B&H $140). Carrying a heavy backpack all day can make your back sore, but what if I told you that you can alleviate some of that pain by carrying around an even heavier backpack?
This backpack has massaging points on the back that will massage you, and to a lesser extent whoever you wind up pressed against on the subway. The backpack has four little vibrating patches – two on the shoulders and two at the lower back. Or, the way knapsacks fall when most people wear them, who knows where they’ll hit? Definitely not the intended places. You’d have to sit down with the backpack on – on a bus or train, for example -- and press your back against it, smushing whatever you have in there.
“Oh, that’s right. I brought salad again today.”
But it’s a good way to get rid of stress, such as the stress of being the only weirdo in the work van wearing a seatbelt with your backpack still on, going, “Aaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh,” and avoiding eye contact.
According to the promotional materials, the battery can give you five hours of massage time, though if you need five hours of massage time in a day, go see a doctor.
There is also a secret pocket for valuables, so if someone steals the backpack… Okay, he’ll still have your valuables, but he won’t immediately realize it! In his face!
It’s also said to be TSA friendly, unless you leave the massaging part switched on while it’s going through the scanner.
The only other downside is you can’t actually wear this in the rain. Or wash it.
You can also get someone the Banana Loca ($30). This is a kitchen gadget that allows you to, quote, “core and fill a banana while it’s still in its peel.” Instead of after taking off the peel, like our ancestors, zichronam livracha.
“Fill it with what?” you ask. Me too.
Well, according to the manufacturer, you can fill it with chocolate spread, peanut butter, jelly, or even custard, like a healthier doughnut! In the old days, you’d have to manually spread these things on your bananas, like a chump, but this way, you have this hard straw thing that pulls out the middle of the banana, and you can do Ribbono-Shel-Olam-knows-what with that, and then you insert another straw into the now-hollow banana and you press the pump and WHOOSH! The banana sails across the room. There’s a learning curve, according to reviews.
And there’s no mess! Besides having to clean peanut butter out of a straw.
And speaking of sholom bayis, what if you’re like, “I want to get my wife jewelry, but I don’t want to spend a lot on something she might not like.” So we say, why not spend a little on something she might not like? You can get her Realistic Spider Earrings (Amazon, $9 each)! These are earrings that look like there is a daddy longlegs gently crawling up the side of the wearer’s face. It’s great for someone who likes fun earrings that are shaped like actual things, as opposed to plain boring geometric shapes, and also for someone who wants to spend their day getting slapped in the face by well-meaning friends. Sometimes by two at once! It’s the gift that keeps on giving.
This is also great if you would like – every time your wife comes near her dresser – to have her heart skip a beat. Not to mention the first time she opens the box.
It might add stress to her day, but then you can be like, “Here! Wear my knapsack.”
Mordechai Schmutter is a weekly humor columnist for Hamodia, a monthly humor columnist, and has written six books, all published by Israel Book Shop. He also does freelance writing for hire. You can send any questions, comments, or ideas to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
