Combined Xmas/Birthday Presents can cause accidents in the home....

It's my wife's birthday today, and I'm writing this post while I'm waiting for it to be the correct time to get my 7 year old daughter up so we can wake up mummy with the worst cup of tea she's had since....well, last year.
I would not wish a birthday 4 days before Xmas on anyone and only think my wife is marginally luckier than the poor sods born between Xmas and New Year, who get treated like their birthday is an real inconvenience in the midst of all the festivities (for festivities read shopping).
As a boyfriend, and then husband, I have learnt the extreme folly of the combined Xmas and birthday present - that nothing, no matter how fantastic, is allowed, and that the punishment for such a folly is death. The trick is plan early, as not to get caught out and make near fatal mistakes such as having to wrap her birthday present in Xmas paper because there's none in the shops on 19th Dec. Same goes for the card - I have a theory that the card shops, when they make room for Xmas stock - only leave out the birthaday cards they could only possibly sell if no others were on display - knowing some badly organised and desperate bloke will happily give them half the contents of his wallet to ensure another years survival.
There is no easy path to redemption either - all the flowers are too 'Xmassy', and the possibility to take the love of your life out for a romantic meal on the 20th December is hampered by the fact that all the tables have been booked since August, and those of us who did actually book a table for two three months ago are then stuck next to a table of 22 cardboard box salesmen who's sole intention was to get drunk as loudly as posible and try and get get off with Sharon from accounts before the inevitable food fight. While this make-shift version of Planet of the Apes is being re-enacted 2 yards away you are stuck eating either off the Xmas menu (the culinary equivalent of the combined present) or from in reduced standard menu, which after a tip off from the card industry, is basically the shit they could only possibly sell when the rest od the stuff is off the menu.
I love my wife dearly, and as I leave now to play my part in 2008's crappest cup of tea, I salute her and all others who have a yuletide birthday, but beg of you one thing - if your other half turns up on your birthday with a very large box and a nerous expression on his face, please let him live.......