A few weeks ago I received a catalog at work (I am on multiple mailing lists both at work and home, receiving approximately the same weight of junk mail at each) from a company called Despair (www.despair.com). Leafing through the pages, I realized this was the company that had created a line of posters and other office paraphernalia based on bitter, twisted, gut-wrenchingly funny demotivational sayings. For those on your gift list who have now or have ever spent time in an office setting, these will all have meaning. The sayings are each embossed beneath a lovely, meaningful photograph and can be found in calendars, sticky note pads, posters, etc. My personal favorite reads MEETINGS: None of us is as dumb as all of us. A close second (and corollary) is IDIOCY: Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups. I'd paper my office with them, except that it might be construed as inappropriate.

Snow, sleet, freezing rain, hail, pestilence and the seven horsemen of the apocalypse are all headed this way between tonight and Saturday morning. Schools will be closed; bread, milk, and eggs will be gone from store shelves; and that forest of skinny sticks with reflective paint at their top that have sprung up around the edge of all of our parking lots will finally be put to use.