Thank you to my Secret Santa for the Amazon Gift Certificate, ideal as there were a couple of books I was looking for so it has already been spent !

Dear Santas JMC of Washington DC and GK of New Providence NJ,

I found out that Mrs Purpleeagl was hiding my presents, but they have arrived! I will give further updates after I open them.

This Santa finally has everything together and they are on the way Priority Mail. I hope the recipients enjoy.

This Santa received one shipment of things for her recipients today unexpectedly. Three day shipping took one day, so while Mr. Kipper is taking a final, I'll be wrapping away, and getting them in the mail this week, assuming the Nor'easters we're supposed to get don't appear. Or, assuming that my 4-wheel drive works if we do.

To my Secret Santa who sent me the great box of champagne flutes and travel goodies -- THANK YOU! I was having a truly miserable day, and I was thrilled to get the box, especially when I saw no "do not open until Christmas" and thus had a clear conscience ripping open all of the packages. The book on things you can do in a hotel room (especially the towel oragami!) was just hilarious and kept me (and a bunch of co-workers) busy much of the afternoon, and a mileage run this weekend (to Ireland!) will allow me to try out the luggage handle wrap, fancy doo-dads to allow me to get every last drop of (much needed) eye cream out of the tube, and I have longed for those space-savers ever since seeing them on TV a long time ago! I actually had just used my last Woolite pack in October, too, so your timing was great. The champagne glasses are very nice, and will be nice to use to toast the new year!

I have enjoyed doing this every year, but this year, this program has especially brightened what has been an otherwise very difficult holiday season. Both my Secret Santas obviously put a lot of time and thought into coming up with great gifts that will make my travel (and non-travel life) easier and more fun. (I actually accused Mr. CheapSk8 of communicating with you because I can't believe two "strangers" could have picked out such perfect gifts!) Thank you to both of my Secret Santas for your thoughtfulness and generosity. Thanks also to wharvey for your work as the grand-poobah of the elves.

Happy holidays to all, and to all a good flight!

Thank you to my secret santa - a large box arrived via UPS today - and I am not going to open it .... yet from Hoffmann & Krippner

I have rec'd notice from my recipient that the gifts arrived.

I am awaiting my shipment with mixed emotions. Excited about the surprise. And trepidation about my partner ("You not only spend hours on line with those people.........now you are exchanging gifts with them! ") But he sure does like sitting in F!

sent my gift today to my secret santa...wrapped and ready for the holiday. thank goodness for priority mail!!

did send a pm to wharvey, like a good little elf, but haven't outed myself to my giftee...and don't intend to.

thanks to flyertalk for the most fun i've had shopping for someone in quite some time. ^

Thank you, Santa! Today I rec'd a box full of assorted gourmet chocolates. Haven't tried them (yet), but they sure look yummy.


The gifts I am sending are now wrapped, boxed and will go out tomorrow.

Well Santa has made his first stop. And I am very happy, I am impressed this person put in extra effort to find a little about me and my interests. I'd say they know me or looked in my window, but this Santa's elf lives near ORD, so I doubt they made it to SNA.

Thanks for the BN stuff! 1001 Buildings you must see before you die, and discovery atlas Australia are PERFECT!!! the escher book is cool as well.

I wanted to say THANK YOU to my secret santa for the gift from Peets Coffee and Tea. I am so SORRY that it took me all week to post a thank you, I have been very sick. It was very thoughtful and I will enjoy drinking my coffee and tea with the mugs. Thanks so much!!

My SS inbound arrived earlier this week while I was on the road. My wonderful wife called with curiosity. (I hadn't told her about SS, and she's never even looked at FT.) Here's how the conversation went:

"Yep"

"Yep"

"Yep"

Pause.

"It sounded like fun so I thought I would give it a try."


Being a wise husband, I knew that her curiosity and amazement of the whole thing required a "yes" answer.

TOO COOL - there's now a box of Godiva chocolates (no way my SS could know that I consider chocolate one of the four major food groups) and a movie trivia game called "Scene It - The DVD Game" - something that looks like it is going to be a LOT of fun.

So thank you SS from Minot, North Dakota!

My outgoing SS leaves El Paso, Texas headed for BC, Canada today. My apologies in advance since it probably will not arrive before Christmas.

And - as a footnote - my wife wishes I had clued her in on Wharvey's Secret Santa thing, she wishes she could have played.

You can always get her to sign up for next year! =)

The Amazons, B&Ns, do put the shipper's name address on stuff (and if you're shipping internationally by any method your name will have to be on things due to customs forms), but that doesn't necessarily mean you'll know who the person is unless you can somehow identify their handle with their name. Sometimes you can; sometimes you can't.

I sent my SS a thank-you note expressing my joy of all the Xmas movie dvds I received to the name/address on the shipping form, but I had no clue on who the person is because name didn't seem to resemble a handle. I even thought of looking at locations under people's handles on FT to try & figure it out, but when I saw in the first post the gazillion people who had actually signed up for FT SS & hasn't really posted on the thread I gave it up, and just decided to enjoy it w/o knowing. Same thing a couple of years ago.

Cheers.

i'm still waiting for the last part of the gift i plan to send to show up. grrr. hurry up UPS! i want to get this out ASAP