This is it-- the busiest shopping day of the year, and the official kick-off to the 2000 Holiday Shopping Season. At dawn, thousands of crazed and overenthusiastic consumers pounded on the locked doors of department stores across the nation, desperate to be admitted so they could slap down the plastic and contribute to the further commercialization of a formerly spiritual occasion. Not that we're passing judgment, you understand; the AtAT staff would have been out there foaming at the wallet with the rest of you, except that we ate so much at Thanksgiving dinner that we actually discovered firsthand why bears hibernate and thus got up shortly before dusk. (We were also sore because our gracious hostess was perverse enough to wait until everybody had gorged themselves silly on the wonderful spread and then pulled out the Twister set. In addition to that "why bears hibernate" thing, we also discovered 1) that there is true evil in this world, and 2) why Twister mats are made of easy-to-clean vinyl.)

That said, we're sure we're not the only ones who wound up forgoing the retail battle today due to the excesses of the night before-- and even those of you who did manage to drag your overstuffed corporeal forms down to the mall to put a dent in that shopping list probably aren't finished yet. That is, unless you're one of those really tiresome people who gets all the shopping done in September and tortures the rest of us by reminding us of that fact ad infinitum until we're forced to plot your slow, painful deaths while we're scrounging for last-minute gifts at a convenience store on Christmas morning. But we digress.

Anyway, the point we wanted to make is that many of you are still in the market for a gift for that certain special someone: the love of your life, your soul mate, your life partner, the one who completes you, the person who sends your heart racing, your smoochie-kitten, whatever. And for that certain special someone, you obviously want to get something that is, in the words of the immortal Shakespeare himself, "romantic as all git-out." As we all know from intense study of The Flintstones, spouses and significant others generally aren't pleased when you get them practical presents like a baby elephant vacuum cleaner or a porcupine dish scrubber. They want prezzies that make them feel all smoochy and stuff, like the time Fred bought Wilma a genuine Stoneway piano from 88-Fingers Louie. The problem is, few of us are as smooth as Fred, and the romantically-challenged need to buy gifts, too. They're probably at a loss as to what to buy for their honeys this year.

AtAT to the rescue! Or, rather, faithful viewer Kevin to the rescue-- because he forwarded us the results of a Yahoo! search for gift ideas matching the keywords "female," "adult," and "romantic." At first we found the list of twenty-eight gift recommendations rather inappropriate; "Rose Petal & Branches Duet Candles"? Yeah, that'll bring the ladies a-runnin'. But that's when we saw it: the most romantic gift ever created in the history of true love. Right next to the "Language Embroidered Eagle Cashmere Sweater" and right underneath the "Velvet Vase With Feather Boa" (!) sits the gift that's sure to get you plastered with wet, sloppy kisses when you give it to your sweetie-- the Power Mac G4 Cube. C'mon, it's a supercomputer in an eight-inch cube! How can you miss? So get out there, Romeo, and get your squeeze a Cube. You won't regret it. And no keeping it for yourself.