Christmas shopping 2008

2008 has been a pretty good and eventful year for me. Amongst other things: I visited the extended family in the Philippines, I've moved into my own place, I attended the weddings of 3 dear friends (one of which required I fly to Australia to attend), and I've befriended a good bunch of (former-)workmates who invite me to a whole host of events, and of that group one of them is this wonderful girl who bakes the most amazing food. In light of everything good that has made my year, I decided to get some sort of Christmas present for the people who have made it so.

Very little of my shopping was actually done at physical retail stores; much of what I got for others had to be shipped from around the country or from overseas. And you know what having things shipped means? Lots of packaging material, especially bubble wrap. Everybody loves bubble wrap.

A roll of bubble wrap
Bubble wrap

I was out last night delivering Christmas presents to the flat of (former-)workmates, when amazing-baking-girl started watching WALL-E. Wanting to avoid the chores that awaited me back at my place, I stayed and watched WALL-E. WALL-E's story is told primarily through sounds and body language, and so lots of universally-understood devices or references are used so viewers know what's going on. At one point, WALL-E is showing EVE some of the stuff he has, including this sheet of bubble wrap. He demonstrates popping it, to which EVE follows by manically popping as much of the sheet as fast as she can. Everybody loves popping bubble wrap.

Dog with bubble wrap in its mouth
This dog likes popping bubble wrap too

This scene reminded me of all the bubble wrap I had accumulated from the presents I had shipped-in, and how when I first received an order which had one of those huge bubbles, I spent several minutes popping the thing before getting to the actual work of wrapping the present. And you know what I did after that? I popped more bubble wrap.

So right up there with the universal language of smiles and laughs, we have bubble wrap. I think I'll try to include a small patch of the stuff with my Christmas cards next year :P

Merry Christmas everybody.