Papyrus is My Crack, or, Did I Really Just Blow $8 on that Sheet?

I cannot be the only one. (Wait... is there seriously a font called "Trebuchet"? Can you only use it to hurl insults? Never mind.) Anyway. 

I cannot be the only one who walks into Papyrus and within minutes stands convinced there is no more perfect piece of wrapping paper than the hand-printed, marbled blue sheet draped over the little bar behind the counter and thinks "Oh yes, it will be mine!"

I cannot be the only one who willingly plunks down $7.95 (a veritable bargain for an artisan, hand-crafted sheet of paper this lovely!), rolls it carefully inward and places a thin rubber band (not too tight!) around it and carries it home like a Ming dynasty porcelain teacup... and like said teacup, takes it out occasionally to look at it, but never actually use it.

Once I saw a shirt in a Public Radio catalog that said "Glitter is My Favorite Color". Indeed. You slather some of the sparkly stuff on a piece of handmade paper, and I'll gladly fork over megabucks for the chance to disperse that glitter all over my face, clothing, purse, rug, and eventually D's clothes and face by sheer proximity - not unlike Lush Bath Bombs (but that's another story).

It's impossible to wrap actual presents with it, of course - I've tried Elmer's Glue, Superglue, Gorilla Glue, double-sided tape, invisible tape, not-invisible tape - you name it... even Hollywood Fashion Tape, which is designed to prevent wardrobe malfunctions and/or toupee slippage - a bizarre and slightly disturbing combination when you think about it.

Eventually, I settled on double-sided tape and the "mad dash" method. That is to say, you wrap the gift without taping anything, take the tape to the location where you're giving the gift, secret yourself away to the kitchen (or restroom in a public establishment) where you proceed to tape that sucker out the wazoo, leaning in on it like an overstuffed suitcase, and then RUN to the lucky recipient and hand over the gift so they see it in all it's perfect, shining, glitter-shedding glory before it pops like a Christmas cracker and disrobes itself faster than Jenna Jameson.

It doesn't matter. I love it. All of it. The glittered ones, and the printed ones. The marbled ones and the retro ones. It's a little piece of art - art you can touch without the ubiquitous navy-blue uniformed museum guard scolding you!

I can't be the only one who takes photos of their wrapping paper - the really good ones that you know you (eventually) have to use or they will turn to dust, so you try to capture that je ne sais quoi that convinced you to fork over the beaucoup bucks in the first place.

By the way, turns out that some glitter is made from mylar - and mylar, turns out, sets off airport bomb detection equipment. And no, I'm not explaining how I know that. Just trust me - save the glitter paper for 'domestic' gifts...