Taking the everyday out of everyday objects

Nothing says holiday season to me like the release of the Neiman Marcus Christmas Book, which always has some fabulous – and fabulously ridiculous – “fantasy gifts.”

Well, the 2017 Christmas Book is out, and I almost had my hands on an actual physical copy of it. A woman in my building, who gets somewhere between 50 to 75 catalogs a week, leaves 49 to 74 of those catalogs on the table in the foyer for me to recycle. Alas, the only one she was interested in this week was the N-M. So I’ll have to do what I always do: download and “thumb” through the pdf version. Damn!

Anyway, as befits an outfit from Texas, the N-M gifts will be outrageously over the top, and I can’t wait to peek inside.

But until I get around to N-M, I thought I’d take a look at a lower-key, more subdued set of “fantasy gifts.” These are the everyday objects that Tiffany, bless their pale blue little hearts, has swanked up and turned into Everyday Objects. And Everyday Objects cost some serious coin, my friends.

What would you pay for a pencil sharpener? A couple of bucks for one of the little plastic ones from Staples? Nine dollars for a crank-handle wall mount? If you were my husband, you’d bag pencil sharpeners entirely and just find the best utility knife in the kitchen and go to town. But if you want a Tiffany’s pencil sharpener, it’s $275.

Some of the everyday objects they’ve turned into Everyday Objects are not even things that you’d pay for. Like a Band-aid box. Of course, they no longer make those old metal Band-aid boxes – just the flimsy cardboard ones. So I suppose if you really have a hankering for an old-timey Band-aid box, and you have $600 to spare, this one’s for you. Too bad they didn’t partner with Johnson & Johnson to use the Band-aid name. Bet they would sell a lot more of these suckers.

Another used-to-be-free item is a sterling ($600) or vermeil ($900) of the little Tiffany box.

THen there’s my personal favorite, the silver and vermeil coffee can. That’ll set you back $1,500, but it will look so much smarter on your desk than a rinsed-out Chock Full o’ Nuts can.

Talk about gifts for the person who has everything, including money. Maybe these are what Melania Trump uses for stocking stuffers? I mean, Barron could sure use a $300 yo-yo, no? Or drive his father crazy – yes! – blowing some tunes on a $385 harmonica. I vote that Barron starts with “Thunder Road.” Not that his father would recognize the song – it’s not “Cat Scratch Fever” by Ted Nugent – but what joy to the world if a reporter got to ask Sarah Huckabee Sanders how Mr. Trump liked hearing Barron play a song by that old leftie Bruce Springsteen.

Shop on, Melania!

Plenty more where the $385 harmonica came from: ping-pong paddles in Tiffany blue ($650). For the STEM girls (and boys) on your list, a triangle ($400) and a protractor ($425). Me? I’m holding out for a compass so I can have a full matched set.

I was also intrigued by the $9,000 (limited edition) ball of sterling silver yarn. Is it actually usable? Does this ball unwind? And what would one make with it? A chain mail vest? My sister Kath is a serious knitter. Her thought was that there might be enough in the ball to make a headband. Which I can actually picture on Gwyneth Paltrow’s head.

Ah, the things you can buy if you have the right attitude and wallet size.

But, given that the aesthetics are pretty darned similar, why not just display the real everyday object, rather than a surreal EVERYDAY OBJECT? Guess I’m just lacking in consuming imagination.

But it has certainly whet my appetite for a good deep dive into the Neiman-Marcus Christmas Book.

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Thanks to my sister Trish, who spotted an article on this on Buzzfeed.