Well, that gift was a success

Note: This story is included especially for the well-defined Natasha fan base among my blog readership, whose continuing, loyal interest in that young lady impresses and touches me very much.

Natasha's eighteenth birthday was last weekend, and that meant buying her a present. Now, I am totally not a gift person, and it's always a hit-or-miss thing when I try to figure out what would be a good present for somebody. In this case, though, Anna and I came across some gargantuan novelty house-slippers made up to look like two big fully stuffed puppy-dogs. Cute as could be, and Natasha is crazy about animals, and Anna assured me that Natasha would like them -- in fact at first Anna intended to buy them for Natasha herself, but then later she found something she thought Natasha would like better. So I gambled on those.

Well, when I gave them to Natasha a couple of days later, Natasha, who is not exactly noted for being demonstrably affectionate, leaped up and gave me a hug of sheer delight. So I thought, "Whew, okay, I think I avoided gift-disaster for this year at least."

Two days later I showed up to give Kinya a ride to the fitness club where she does physical therapy most evenings, and Anya and Natasha decided to go along as well. Natasha walked out the front door headed for my car, and from the driver's seat I observed in a mixture of amusement and astonishment that she was wearing those house-slippers, clearly with every intention of going to Lifetime Fitness thusly shod. As she walked up to the car, I said rather diffidently, "Um, Natashenka, you do realize those shoes are meant to be worn around the house, not out and about town, right?"

Natasha chose the always-sound rhetorical tactic of answering my question with a question of her own. "Papa, these shoes are mine, right?"

I chuckled. "Of course they are."

Firmly: "Then I'm wearing them." End of conversation, and off to Lifetime went the girls, myself...and two very self-satisfied stuffed puppy-dog house-slippers.

So, um, I think that present was a hit.