You have those family members who are nearly impossible to shop for; I can help.

If you like them, you can hit [tag]Archie McPhee[/tag] and just buy them some awesome stuff they just didn’t know they needed.

If your relationship is a bit more tenuous, you may want to be more creative. It sounds weird to exert extra effort for the difficult, belligerent or just plain crazy, but the payoff is worth it. There’s a slim chance you might actually make your relative happy, but don’t bank on it. What you and your other relatives will get out of this is something to giggle over for years to come, and isn’t that what the holidays are all about?

Family faction-building is the reason for the season!

Just ask yourself a few simple questions about the relative in question and you’ll be on your way to the simplest gift shopping experience ever.

Do they enjoy home improvement but have a severe germ phobia? Your worries are over once you buy them home improvement tools that can withstand autoclaving.

Have an aunt who had a mid-life crisis and became a holistic healer and now drones on about how your doctor is wrong and she’s right and eliminating nightshades will solve all of your problems, no matter what the ailment? Maybe Santa can fill her stocking with a nice fat order of [tag]medicinal leeches[/tag].

Do you have that hypochondriac cousin who’s sure every Christmas is going to be their last? Try the [tag]National Museum of Funeral History[/tag] Gift Shop, or perhaps [tag]Skeletons in the Closet[/tag], the gift shop at the [tag]L.A. County Morgue[/tag]. (Skeletons in the Closet might also be a great choice for that no-good brother in law you always have to post bail after his annual Christmas Eve drunk and disorderly at that Irish bar that should have banned his ass from the premises about a decade ago, but he’s just always so contrite and he tips real well and the owner just can’t ever bring himself to file the paperwork).

Actually have a family member who seems a little too normal? (I’ve heard it can happen). You can be sure they’re scarred for the rest of their life with a well-chosen gift from the [tag]Ringling Circus Museum[/tag].

And for that family member who’s never going to be happy, not matter how hard you try? The dyspeptic gasbag who is, even as I type, probably in the next room blaring a football game on the television while declaiming to all who even appear to be listening just how Hillary killed Vince Foster and got away with it?

I recommend giving that guy [tag]syphilis[/tag] or perhaps a nice intestinal parasite or two.

Pot-Luck [tag]Parasitology Specimens[/tag]: great for teaching … you’ll never know what you will find

We are overstocked with mixed specimens of fecal parasites. These vials of formalin, SAF, PVA or Zinc are ideal for teaching or for internal proficiency purposes. All have some type of either protozoa and/or helmith ova. The quantity of organisms present is unknown. It is truly pot luck, but the price is certainly right. Each vial contains from 3-15ml of material, each package contains 20 vials.

You can thank me later.