Because I was bored the other day, I did some math while listening to "The 12 Days of Christmas."
There were 23 birds given during the aforementioned 12 days. Think about that for a second...23 birds. Even by Victorian standards, that's a lot of poultry. I imagine that the lady's "True Love", being a typically clueless gift giving dude thought to himself "She really seemed to like that partridge in a pear tree. That means she likes birds. I'm gonna get her more birds."
After the 4th day, the lady was hinting strongly that if she got any more birds, she would deck him instead of the halls, so he ditched the 5 Chickens Clucking and resorted to jewelry...always a safe fallback gift. Unfortunately, he'd already bought the 7 swans a swimming and the 6 geese a laying and lost the receipts...which is why his beloved got 5 rings instead of one K-Mart chain purchased right before closing.
You have to be really careful when even casually mentioning things you like around gift giving times. I'm reminded of the time I made an offhand remark to Sainted Wife's grandmother that I liked Red Hots. What I meant was that once every 10 years or so, I might eat half a box of Red Hots, remember why I stopped eating them in third grade and throw the rest away.
What she took from the conversation was that Red Hots were my absolute favorite thing in the whole wide world. Which explains why I received a four-foot plastic candy cane full of Red Hots the following Christmas. In retrospect, I wish I had told her I liked 5 dollar bills.
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