Stocking Stuffer Ideas
…but not the kind you’re thinking of
Feel like sending a little extra love my way? ↓
Yup, I’m still here.
Well, sort of. What I mean is I haven’t given up on Substack. But my physical “here” has changed from Boston to Savannah, GA. And one consequence of that move was that the past 6-8 weeks of my life have been…what’s the word…?
Busy as fuck.
Yeah, that’s it.
It’s been a full month since I posted anything on here, which is the longest I’ve gone without writing in a very long time, and I forgot how hard it is to get back into a creative practice like writing after you’ve fallen out of it for a while.
So, I’m trying to ease myself back into things by writing something short today. Since we’re getting pretty close to Christmas, I thought I’d write about something Christmasy. And since I’ve still got a bit of a creative hangover after moving for the second time this calendar year, I only had enough mental bandwidth to pursue the literal first idea for a writing topic that occurred to me, which I can only describe as somewhat…shower-thoughty.
It’s actually cruder than that, though, since it’s a thought that occurred to me while I was still lying in bed half-asleep this morning. So, maybe it’s more accurate to describe it as pre-shower-thoughty. The thought was this:
Is it just me, or does “stocking stuffer” sound kinda like it could be a mildly derogatory slur?
So, 6 days ahead of Christmas (at the time of writing), here are 6 tastefully derogatory definitions of the term “stocking stuffer” that my pre-shower, pre-coffee brain managed to hatch.
Enjoy.
“Stocking Stuffer” = Sycophant
We could all use a bit of buttering up every now and then, just as we all enjoy finding a festive assortment of breath mints, hand sanitizer, and Pikachu Band-Aids in our stockings on Christmas morning. It’s quite nice and good fun…in small doses. But there’s only so much space in our junk drawers for such cheap trinkets. Most of us have an innate sense of when enough is enough, while others of us are…well, stocking stuffers.
“Dave, I understand you really want that promotion, and we all very much appreciate your can-do spirit, but you’re being a bit of a stocking stuffer right now.”
“Stocking Stuffer” = Someone with body image issues
Decades of ocular bombardment by increasingly grander billboards, television ads, and social media filters have made stuffers of us all, leading us toward our own psychological impalement on the cold blade of idealistic body images that we so warmly embrace. We’re stuffing up there, down there, and everywhere. Yeah, we all know what I’m talking about: God forbid I skip one leg day. We get it, soccer players: you like to run around and stuff. Sorry I don’t look like Christiano Ronaldo down there. We can’t all have perfect calves.
“Did you hear that Steve’s a stocking stuffer? Yeah, he went to try out for track and field, and someone caught him stuffing in the locker room.”
“Stocking Stuffer” = Lowly mob grunt
Mobs are, of course, hierarchical organizations: you’ve got the bosses at the top and the muscle below them—the guys who do the dirty work to keep their superiors’ pinstripe suits looking neat and spiffy. Some jobs require firearms, while others can be carried out with just a fist or two. But I imagine both of those methods start feeling a bit stale after a while. Sometimes you just want to get a bit more creative and instill some discipline with something like a sock full of batteries. And someone somewhere far down the ladder rungs must be responsible for collecting and supplying the batteries to fill said sock—to “stuff” it, if you will.
“You want I should give ‘em the ol’ stocking stuffer, boss?”
“Stocking Stuffer” = Common Thief
Because all those Snickers bars and Pikachu Band-Aids gotta go somewhere.
“Hands where I can see them, stocking stuffer!”
“Stocking Stuffer” = Stripper
Because all those dolla dolla bills gotta go somewhere.
“Poor Stacy is out there stuffing her stockings to pay for medical school.”
Or, if you prefer to be a bit more optimistic and 21st-century about it:
“That Stacy is one bad bitch. Look at her sticking it to the patriarchy by fleecing all those sad, weak men of their dirty money. You go girl! Keep stuffing those self-empowered stockings right in their ugly, imperialistic male-gazing faces.”
“Stocking Stuffer” = Irritatingly outdated, yet still commonly employed technology
Speaking of entering the 21st century, why in Santa’s holly jolly name are we still jamming all that crumpled up tissue paper into shoes, shoe store people? There’s gotta be a better way, just as there’s gotta be a better way, bakery people, to keep bread fresh than twist ties, or a better way to tell me how much a drinking glass costs, retail people, than a paper sticker with NASA-grade adhesive backing that will never ever completely come off, no matter how many times it’s run through the dishwasher or given the old fashioned elbow grease scrub. Someone get to work on this shit. It’s “Chris Kringle,” not Chris…
“Crinkle crinkle crinkle”
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