How to Evaluate Your Man's Christmas Shopping Style

You know what’s really sexy? A man who likes to go shopping. Not just tool shopping or car shopping, sporting goods or computer game shopping. Actual "shopping" shopping. As in shopping for stuff a man realistically couldn’t care less about. For instance, shopping for Christmas gifts for other people. Whether they're platonic friends, boyfriends or husbands, most men fall into one of these categories when it comes to shopping.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

The Gung Ho Shopping Assistant: Most sought after man on the planet.

1. Per capita there are about seven of these guys alive. Are you lucky enough to have one? Take a good look at your man when he is surrounded by the most unnatural of male environments: the shopping mall.
   
   Ask yourself: Does he stand ready to help you in your pursuit to find "the" best present for everybody on your shopping list?
2. Reflect: Does he appropriately “ooh” and “aah” over every potential
   “something” you consider buying--if for no other reason than he spent decades following his own mother around in the same fashion with a shopping cart in tow?
   
   Was he educated by the systematic way that she worked her way up and down aisles bursting with merchandise, dodging intense cart traffic, that this is definitely not merely "shopping" to the female of the species?
3. Consider: Is he patient and motivated even after you've visited ten different stores, holding up one item after the other, asking, "How about this for Aunt Gertie?"
   
   Does he jump right in to help you select the right nightgown for Mom, the right dress shirt and necktie for Dad?
4. Analyze: Will he let you cry on his shoulder when you've traveled the mall circuit and have yet to put your hands on exactly what you want to wrap and give to your own best girlfriends?
5. Project: Will he spend the whole month of December contentedly strolling through stores as you stroke and fondle this and that? As you fiendishly raid jewelry cases in every store just to find something special to give to his sister until the mall starts to spin like a whirling dervish around you?

The Affirmative Shrugger and Nodder: These guys are everywhere.

6. The world is full of this type of male shopper. Give him credit for at least pretending he's interested. Observe your man while cruising the aisles of typical chain department stores, like Sears or JC Penny's.
   
   Ask yourself: Does he stand like a corpse risen from the dead as he waits deadpan behind you?
   
   Are his hands generally jammed in his pockets as he waits and waits and WAITS for you to stop working your way through a stack of comforters to pick one for Grandma or a mountain of flannel pajamas for Grandpa heaped in a nice big bin?
7. Reflect: When you show him each selection for his consideration, does he instantly shrug and nod, muttering, "Sure, darlin', that's a good one."
   
   If you pointed at the worn burgundy store carpet you're standing on or the black store surveillance globe overhead, the kid loitering in front of the Legos display laboriously picking his nose, would he still shrug and nod, "Yup, that’s a good choice, honey--real good."
8. Test Question: If you brought home a warm 12-pack of off-brand beer you happened to find on sale and he saw it just before the green flag lap on Sunday, would he suddenly spring to life and shriek in dismay, "Awww, geez"?
9. If you answered "Yes" to the above, take heart. He loves you, it's the shopping he hates. Take him to a sporting goods store and watch him come alive for "trying" as your shopping assistant.

The Sulky Shopper

10. The eternal sufferer, these guys could win Academy Awards with those shopping performances! Observe your man in any environment that happens to involve some retail shelves and a cash register.
    
    Ask yourself: Would he literally sell his soul to be at home on a weekend afternoon, lounging supine catching a football game or a NASCAR race on TV instead of pushing a shopping cart?
11. Reflect: Does he roll his eyes and sigh every ten seconds as you feverishly hunt down your mother’s favorite lingerie at Dillard's or his mother’s favorite fragrance at Macy's?
12. Consider: Does he make sure that everybody within earshot knows that you are taking much too much time looking for gifts when you can easily just stick a few bucks in a card or, better yet, buy a slew of gift cards for everybody and is it time to go home yet, please pretty please?
13. Analyze: Is he constantly reminding you that while you dilly-dally with racks of underwear or an aisle filled with smelly foo-foo, he has some crucial couch time to put in and a sporting event on TV to catch?
    
    Does he whine and moan that: 1) your mother doesn’t need more expensive underwear and 2) his mother needs more than an expensive bottle of perfume to smell good?
14. Test Question: Who's the masochist here, you or him? Leave him at home next time and shop to your heart's content!

The Shopping Tantrum King: He puts on a show everywhere he goes

15. Why we even take these guys out shopping with us is a mystery! Observe this man the instant he puts his hands on a shopping cart.
    His philosophy is, "Any shopping trip for a Christmas gift that takes longer than five minutes is a ridiculous waste of time."
    
    Does he pace the departments you are shopping in as if he is waiting for a bail bondsman to arrive to help him make his break from the retail slammer?
16. Reflect: Will he angrily sprint from one end of the aisle to the other with that brimming shopping cart, doing wheelies and practically laying rubber as you round each endcap?
17. Consider: Does he storm up to you and loudly demand, "ARE YOU DONE YET?" as you placidly shake her head "No"? Will he practically heave his body against shelves filled with towels and sheets and cry like an infant?
18. Answer "Yes," to the above and you'll completely understand why, as much as the rest of us love shopping, we love these guys even more for the comedy they bring to the whole shopping experience.
    
    Imagine how ordinary it would be to drag home well-filled plastic bags from such target-rich retail hunting grounds like Kohls and Wal-Mart, knowing we went, we shopped, and we took no prisoners in our pursuit to get the most bang for our Christmas shopping buck!

The Coke and Smoke We've-Been-Married-Too-Long-for-Me-to-Get-Upset Shopping Realist.

19. These guys take the award for patience and understanding, hands down! Observe your man in the busiest shopping center imaginable. Where is he?
    
    He's getting himself a drink. A big drink. He finds himself a nice quiet bench in the entry way and reaches for his cigarettes.
    
    He sits and either reads the paper or casually watches those who come and go as he leisurely smokes and sips, sips and smokes.
20. Reflect: Has he long since come to the conclusion that you are going to shop your brains out once you've set foot in a store? Sure, he has. Does he realize that the best path to take, when it comes to shopping (especially women doing Christmas shopping)is the path of least resistance? Ditto.
21. Consider: When you're ready to leave, he'll know as you emerges from the checkouts with your bags of precious booty in tow. He’ll smile, you’ll smile. It’s been a perfectly lovely afternoon for both of you.
22. If you answered "Yes" to the above, can the rest of us borrow this Shopping Prince sometime?