Features

There are three certainties in life - death, taxes and a man's difficulty at buying lingerie as a gift.

By Conor Hogan

It’s the first week of December, you look out the window of your tiny apartment and the driveway resembles the coastal mountainous areas of Alaska. Fairytale of New York is playing in the background on the radio and suddenly it dawns on you. Christmas is coming and you'll have to get going with the present shopping.

Normally this wouldn't be a problem for you. The kind of man who waits until almost the last couple of days to do your Christmas shopping. The kind of man who makes practically all of his purchases in one shop or two. Who every year makes it easier for himself by buying only three types of gifts - books, DVDs and vouchers.

This year is different, however. Because this year you made a mistake. Sometime last week, as a way of making conversation, you went and asked people what they wanted. Now, most of them said that they didn't mind, or they didn't want anything, or they wanted a surprise or that they wanted a book or a DVD or a voucher, but one of them, yes, one of them ... well ... she didn't. She asked for something you knew you'd struggle with. She asked for something which the thought of buying sends shivers down your spine. She asked you for lingerie.

Gift

This isn't something you've ever considered buying as a gift. It isn't a functional kind of clothing, it is not something she'll be wearing around and when she does wear it, she'll be taking it off pretty quickly anyway. Not that it isn't great that your other half is interested in it, as it acts as a kind of green light - an indicator that she is in the mood for what cheesy Latin singers refer to as amore. You only wish she'd buy it herself because, frankly, you don't have a bloody clue.

A multitude of worries are bouncing around your head like Jayne Mansfield in an inflatable castle. You worry that you'll make a bad purchase - that if you go too reserved it will turn her off or make her feel bad about herself, that if you go too saucy she might interpret you as calling her a slapper. You fear that you won't buy the right colour for her hair colour and skin type, or the wrong shape for her body type.

You fear entering the shop and wandering around 'that section,' touching tights and knickers, having to ask for assistance. Having to insist that you're not a transvestite, while also insisting that you have nothing against transvestites and that you respect their lifestyle choice. Getting so nervous that your voice squeaks like a pubescent teenager sitting on a cactus after overdosing on helium. Drawing attention to yourself by accidently pulling down a shelf, before hurriedly running out of the shop not realising you have a bra on your head.

Lenggries

"Get down to it," you tell yourself. "The longer you leave it, the harder it will get." Firstly, you root through her undie drawers to make sure you have information you need regarding her size. Your next port of call is the Google search engine, which you nervously mistype into and accidently come up with some information about Lenggries, which is a town in Upper Bavaria.

It has a population of about 9,500 people and its economy depends mostly on tourism, its main attractions being an Italian baroque style church built in 1722 and Castle Hohnenburg, where Adolf of Luxembourg lived, while it is also the home town of Alpine skier Martina Ertl-Renz, who won a silver medal in the Giant Slalom at the 1994 Winter Olympics.

You realise that all the research you've been doing on this obscure German town is just procrastination and you decide that it might be best to ring somebody who might be able to give you some good information. The first people you try are Ann Summers, and you randomly call their branch in Cork.

"We can't give you that kind of information over the phone," the woman says, as if it was somehow classified. As if the WikiLeaks scandal has made them wary that if tips on buying lingerie for your partner were to come into the public domain, it would surely escalate tensions in the Korean Peninsula.

Experts give their lingerie advice