With no kids, we're safe from the vast majority of these. But my father-in-law has scored some real winners. He's a sucker for every novelty sold by the hucksters at the state fair... slicers and dicers, magic chamois cloths, things like that.

Last year he gave us one of those tiny fountains. You know the kind: a ceramic bowl, a bunch of pebbles, and a simple pump that recirculates the water. We live in a old house with old wiring and we never have enough outlets, so we had few options for it. In the bedroom it kept us awake, in the living room it became a kitty drinking fountain, and when resting on my desk it spattered drops of water over important papers. It's now in the basement in the 'give-away' pile.