One year the spending limit for our workplace gift exchange was $20. I found the Showgirls fancy DVD boxed set at HMV for $5, so I bought four of them and wrapped them as a single gift.

This was widely considered the second worst present I brought while working there. https://twitter.com/ChuckWendig/status/1253111279167975424

Third place would go to the time I found a massive art book celebrating black velvet paintings, bound in velvet. It was an abomination and I was very proud to contribute it to the gift exchange.

But the very worst gift I ever contributed to my workplace gift exchange was a special edition Zune with a fancy leather case and all the accessories.

I worked for Apple at the time.

Shoutout to the person at my Q&A at Alaska Comicon who asked “have you always been like this”

Later I found out that the Showgirls boxed sets caused a lot of trouble for the guy who won them — his wife picked him up from work that night and did not for a second believe him that he got not one, not three, but FOUR copies of Showgirls in the work gift exchange.

And then he went straight to his in-laws place for a holiday dinner and someone spotted all of the Showgirls DVDs in the back seat of his car and his in-laws also did not believe his story about the gift exchange.

I tried to help out by telling his wife that I really did put four copies of the Showgirls DVD boxed set into the gift exchange, but she accused me of lying to cover for her husband.

“Who would buy FOUR COPIES of Showgirls for a gift exchange? That doesn’t make any sense at all”