My entire family is very aware that my life involves an unusual amount of travel and adventure; however, based on my recent Christmas presents, it has become clear that they might be a little hazy on the specifics of just what exactly it is that I do.

For the past two years in a row, MY UNCLE has given me a police-issue taser gun. Okay, cool. Even though no one in my family has let me try it on them yet, it seems pretty straight forward. You just press it against a "bad guy's" skin and pull the trigger, right?

Right. Except, who is this Bad Person? Why are they trying to hurt me? Did they come upon me unawares, while I was asleep? If so, unless I go to sleep each night holding the taser in my hand, I am going to need some time to find it, and get it out of whatever drawer I keep it hidden in. At which point, I would probably choose any other weapon. If my assailant has brought some type of projectile weapon or gun to the fight, or even a baseball bat, how am I supposed to get close enough to him to use my little taser?

"Stay still, while I touch you with this!"

It would involve running towards, not away from, this Evil Person. Just like a bottle of poison, I could have a vile of the deadliest potion in the world, but unless I can get him to stop shooting and drink it, it's pretty much useless.

"Put down your gun, Evil Man, I have prepared refreshments."

This is of course assuming that someone is trying to kill me (which I don't think they are) and that I don't just pull out the taser whenever I am losing a fight with Seth, which sounds much more likely.

Next, there is the gift that MY GRANDMOTHER has now given me on two different Christmases (my family likes to double down on their presents, I'm learning), and this one is a real doozy. There is no widely recognizable name for this tool, even though it has the most highly specific task you could possibly think of: it is a tool designed to help me escape from a vehicle that has been driven off a bridge and into a body of water. I am flattered, but yeah. My family has no idea what I do, they just know it's sometimes dangerous.

The creators of this overly complicated tool have thought of everything one might need in this very specific, horrifying situation, and if I didn't have a "Number One Way I'd Prefer Not To Die" before receiving this present, I do now. Thanks, Mamaw.

Once again, just like with the taser, the usefulness of this tool pretty much presupposes that I have it clutched in my hand at all times. Too many scenarios have played out in my head where my Jeep plummets over the side of a bridge and into the lake, the car is rapidly filling up with water, but not so fast that I probably couldn't have escaped and lived -- if only I weren't too busy rummaging through the glove box, searching for Mamaw's special tool.

I drive over a massive bridge daily, so I have had a lot of time to think about this. And I'm not going to lie, for a brief period I would in fact get this tool out of my console and hold it in my hand each time I approached the bridge. I'd go over all the next steps in my head, and this where things start to unravel; because if I am this prepared for my accident, why not take my preparedness to the next level?

Instead of waiting to cut my seatbelt off with the tool's special seatbelt-cutting blade, I should probably just unbuckle my seatbelt entirely and be ready. Next, there would be no need to break the glass with the tool's tungsten steel spike or use its special glass-bashing hammer if my window were already rolled down upon impact, so I should probably roll all the windows down, just to be safe.

In fact, if I were already partially out of the window, that would save some precious time, too. But oh shit! What if once I emerge from the water, whoever it is that ran me off the bridge shows up to finish the job?!

So now I'm flying down the highway towards a bridge with my seatbelt off and my body halfway out of the window, holding my drowning/escape apparatus in my hand and a police-issue taser in my teeth. Thanks, Mamaw and Uncle Greg, I'm going to nail this!

Hold on, can tasers get wet?

So in conclusion, do you have a special nature photographer in your life? Or any other adventuresome person who you need to buy a present for, but are a tad hazy on the specifics of exactly what they do for a living? Maybe you are uncertain about what they do, but based on their personality, you get the distinct impression that multiple people probably want to murder this person? Most likely in a variety of unusual but cinematic ways? Then either of these two gifts would be perfect!

I do want to mention here, because I find it hilarious, that the manufacturers of the Car Drowning Tool recommend that you always keep the metal spike covered with the included plastic cap, because it "could cause fatal injury to children." Well, sure, I guess if you bashed their little brains in with it, but that could be true of almost anything!

Just like I always tell the TSA agents when they try to take something innocuous away from me in the security line, saying it "could be used as a weapon" -- yes, so could every other item in my backpack, if I set my mind to it and really wanted to kill someone on your plane! Give me back my antique Tibetan trumpet, you buffoons, and I will show you how I could just as easily bash your head in using this man's laptop...!

Okay, I can kind of see why someone might want to murder me in my sleep. Or awake. Or on a bridge.

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Want to hear more about me dying? I contemplate being murdered/eaten by a lion HERE.