My family has it so easy when it comes to buying for me at Christmas. They just keep an eye out for cool Elvis stuff in stores and especially in catalogs. If my mom, wife, brother or children find something they’re pretty sure I don’t already have, they snap it up. Christmas 2005 was no exception.
Did you get some Elvis goodies for Christmas? I had a banner year. Sometimes I think just once I should say to everyone, “OK, no Elvis this year. What I would really like is some shirts.” Naaah… That’s never going to happen.
My wife is getting especially adept at finding unique Elvis gifts. For example, have you ever seen the ’68 Comeback Special Salt & Pepper Shaker Set? I like it, but I just can’t imagine how they came up with the design. The salt shaker looks like a ceramic hockey puck, except it sits upright. On the front is a picture of Elvis in the famous black leather outfit.
The black leather hockey puck salt shaker sits in a little black base that has ELVIS across the front, spelled out with simulated strings of red lights like in the special. The surprise is that this base is the pepper shaker. To be honest, the set is not really very functional, so it will stay in the box as a collectible. That’s good, because my wife had no intention of allowing them on her dining-room table, anyway.
The best Elvis gift my wife found for me is the “All About ELVIS Puzzle.” Someday, when I retire, I’m going to put this one together. That will take a long time, as the puzzle contains 1000 pieces. There’s no way I could tackle it now. The center of the 27” by 20” finished product is Elvis in the turtleneck sweater from the pool scene in Jailhouse Rock. Around the edges of the puzzle are 25 boxes about the size of playing cards. Each one contains a picture, a paragraph detailing his life history, and a trivia fact.
The puzzle box says, “You’ll become an Elvis expert” while completing the puzzle, but I’ll bet anybody deep enough into Elvis to get this as a gift probably is an Elvis expert already. The bottom line — it’s a great gift and well appreciated.
My strangest Elvis gift, so therefore the coolest, was from my son. Somewhere, he found gourmet popcorn in the most unique packaging you can imagine: a 24” high, clear plastic guitar with a picture of Elvis from Blue Hawaii pasted on the body. It’s a very thick guitar, so it holds a fair amount of popcorn, and it stands upright quite well. When it’s emptied, the slot on top lets it become a coin bank. I can see me using it as a bank, but I may have a problem. My wife is pretty possessive about my pocket change for that Georgia Bulldogs bank of hers.
I truly hope Christmas 2005 was as good for all you other Elvis fans as it was for me. It will be interesting to see what the year 2006 holds for Elvis World.
© 2006 Philip R Arnold www.elvisblog.net