A ROCK

Ok, I think I mentioned a while back that we organized a Secret Santa exchange at work. Maybe I didn't, but anyway. At the beginning of December, we thought it would be fun to do a Secret Santa gift exchange at work. We have done it in the past with good and bad results. Some people were really into it and some not so much. Well this year yielded the same results.

The rules were that it would only be over about a 2 week period. No one was asked to spend a lot of money, just give little random gifts throughout the 2 week period and then a bigger gift on/around Christmas Eve. We asked that no one feel obligated to spend beyond their limits but to just have fun with it. I found some neat little gifts for my Secret Pal and randomly left them at her desk or in her mail box...a little gift box with some cherry cordial Hershey kisses, a handful of hot cocoa creme Hershey kisses left on her desk, a small tube of hand lotion, some Christmas earrings that I actually got free with another purchase, and then for the finale a neat gift box with a pair of Christmas socks, an ornament and some more kisses. Pretty nice, huh? And, I saw some of the neat things that some of the other coworkers received too.

Well, now we get to the not so great stuff. Guys apparently don't get it. Not everyone participated and that was ok, that was their choice. Well, 2 of the guys in the clinic chose to. One had to ask his wife if they could handle the finances of it first. Well, he did buy a gift, one gift, and that was some funny Santa frame thingy, I didn't see it, I just heard about it. Well, he goes up to the person whose name he had and says, "did you like your Secret Santa gift?" She was sort of speechless at this point and says, "well, yeah...." And he says, "Well, I'm your Secret Santa". And just spills it just like that. It wasn't even Christmas yet. Then we come to my Secret Santa. The first couple of days, I thought it was pretty cool. I came back from lunch to find a cookie on my desk, addressed to me. This happened 2 days in a row, the second time there was also a sucker. Well, the handwriting was pretty easy to figure out. It was obviously a guy's handwriting. So, I narrowed it down to the 2 that were participating. Then on the 2nd day, one of the lab techs shared how the xray tech had shared a cookie with her that day. Ding, ding, ding. I figured out right there that it was him!! Duh! So, I figured that from then on maybe I would either keep getting cookies or something else, but nope, nothing. But, that's ok, I guess I shouldn't be greedy. But, I was a little disappointed as I kept seeing my other coworkers keep getting some fun stuff.

Well, I knew that this xray tech was going to be off a few days here and there around the holidays, so I figured that was probably why I didn't see much after that. Then Christmas Eve came around and we realized that we hadn't planned very well how we were going to do the reveal. Many people had that day off. So, the ones who were there, just decided to give their final gifts and the rest could come back on the following Monday to finish up. Well, this xray tech comes up to me on Christmas Eve and says, "hey, I owe you. I couldn't find what I wanted to get you." So, I'm ok with that, I guess I'll let the suspense wait until Monday. I knew that he was working one final day at the clinic until he accepted a new position within the organization and would no longer be with us. So, right away this morning (the monday after Christmas), he hands me a leather Indian-type bag. It's really heavy. And, you know me and my sense of humor. I say, "What did you get me, a ROCK!" So, I unwrap the string around the bag and I pull it out and what do I find?? A ROCK!! He actually gave me a ROCK!!

Ok, so it is kind of pretty and all, not just some rock he dug out of the backyard. I think it is a quartz of some kind. I asked if it was, sort of hoping for an explanation or some hidden meaning, but he just said, "yeah, I think it is a quartz." Boy, did I feel dumb, I had to have shown some sort of disappointment on my face. What do you do in a situation like that? I don't remember telling him that I collected rocks or gave him any indication that type of gift was something I would enjoy. Brian likes it, but he also agrees that it is an odd gift. At least my close coworkers got a chuckle out of it.

I decided I would add some pictures for you to get the real effect.