My ex-husband on our last Christmas together bought me a frying pan, slippers that were too small (I wear a size six) and a used paperback copy of "Out of Africa" with a sales receipt in it for a bookmark.
Also to those of you that have gotten various appliances,you should have followed my sister-in-laws' example. She told her husband. "If it comes with a cord, it is an appliance not a present."