Secret Satan – Secret Santa's sinister sister
Take the edge of those unwanted gifts with this game.
Release the hounds of hell
Does the image above disturb you? The answer, of course, is yes, yes and thrice yes. It is vile, scary, unnerving, ferocious, gummy, teethy and bitey. Quite frankly the stuff of nightmares.
It’s taken from a glossy coffee-table book entitled 'Underwater Dogs' which was gifted to a friend of mine some years ago by a family member. It is also worth noting that at the time, her only pets were two cats.
The premise of this photographic book, was to throw a ball in a swimming pool and snap the dogs jumping in to retrieve it from below the water line. Thus transforming what were, no doubt, a bunch of cuddly pooches into an increasingly monstrous line-up of Hellhounds. We didn’t have AI back then you know, it all had to be done manually with wetsuits and swimming pools.
I think the why of the book’s existence is a lot easier to understand than the why, oh why, was it given to my cat-loving friend?!?!
The thing is, with this type of abomination of a gift, you never really get to the bottom of the ‘why’ because we’re all too damned polite. An insincere thank you is usually all they get by way of an inquisition.
Which leads to a lot of speculation…
Was it a till-side panic-buy?
Was it hastily re-gifted when they’d realised they’d forgotten you?
Did they steal it from a hotel?
Was it because although not appropriate, it was heavily discounted in the sales and they thought you’d appreciate the ‘value’?
Have they just had a stroke?
Do they work in a school… and the children made it?
Was it part of a 3-for-2 deal?
Do they assume everyone likes crochet?
Did they find it in the street?
No end of possibilities, but the fact remains, you’re now lumbered with a Yoga Cats calendar and next Christmas is a helluva long way off… enter from stage left, Secret Satan… the saviour of godawful gifting.
Just to be clear there are no religious ‘heaven and hell’ connotations here, we just thought it was a clever anagram of Santa with a negative vibe, and they both like to dress in red. By all means devour some sacrificial goat’s cheese at the gathering too if you like… but only if teamed with Carr’s water biscuits, obviously.
Secret Satan follows the same gameplay as Secret Santa – here’s a quick recap if you missed it:
It was invented for three reasons:
As a way of showcasing truly mindbogglingly lamentable gifts, that obviously you can't shriek at when you're given them, but now you can re-wrap them, and bring them along in January so that collectively you can all be in utter astonishment and revel in their sheer horror or hilarity.
It’s a great way of guilt-free re-gifting ‘nice’ Christmas gifts too, that just don’t fit with your style or lack of.
It really adds a dash of social sparkle to your otherwise exceptionally dull January.
The second year we decided to do this, I was gifted a pink 'flannel, mini-towel & slipper' set for Christmas by a well meaning relative. Instead of sighing inwardly as the three items (each a slightly different shade of pink) were revealed, I was literally thinking 'Yes! I'm going to smash Secret Satan this year!', which I can tell you, really takes the edge off a bad gift.
I would illustrate this beauty with a photo, but even AI can't picture it's hideousness… even after 17 attempts! Sadly the 3-piece is no longer together, but the slippers did turn up for the following two Secret Satans, much to everyone's horror and hilarity.
On a more practical note Secret Satan is also a great vehicle to offload any gift you may have, that is good quality but just not a good fit for you. So now's a good time to dig out that lovely, yet giant, Ted Baker purse or perhaps that floating Bath DAB Radio. One woman's trash is another woman's treasure.
Warning: if the average age of those playing is above 40 there will be a LOT of hand cream doing the rounds.
Let Secret Satan commence!
The rules:
There is no estimated budget to stick to here, you’ll know when you’ve been gifted one. Feel free to add a bar of chocolate to take the edge off, camel's milk is the preferred choice.
The item must have been given in earnest as a gift to you or a family member. It doesn’t have to have been gifted this Christmas and could even be a birthday or other event gift.
From this point onward the rules are exactly the same as Secret Santa although you can imagine the stealing takes on a different vibe. Deciding whether to cut your losses and go for the crocheted zipper pouch or stick with the Carol Singers CD, despite not owning a CD player, really is the ultimate dilemma.
After much shrieking and disbelief the game ends when the last present has been unwrapped.
At which point swaps are available. Thank Christ!
Swaps are actually very funny in themselves as they reveal who actually likes what, usually at least 30% of recipients go home with something they quite like, and we can all feel good about the recycling element to the game.
Let’s save the planet, one Secret Satan at a time!
Bonus round
For a few years running we played this in the same 'olde' country pub, which was already full of 'pub tatt', i.e. horse brasses, figurines, bellows etc. The après-game was to subtly add any of the Secret Satan gifts into the scene of the pub's permanent display… bring on the hand-crafted candle holder and set of three tiny brass jugs. It was incredible to discover that some of these new items lived on for years afterwards in the pub, exactly where we'd left them! Only the cleaner must have noticed the new additions.
I hope that some of you might like to give this a go, it really does lift your January!
You're welcome.
K8x
Thank you for being here, please ❤️ (below) if you enjoyed this piece, it really helps others find it.