My new Secret Santa tradition

Years ago, I participated in the Reddit worldwide Secret Santa gift exchange. In fact, I have two certificates from the Guinness Book of World Records for participating in the world’s largest Secret Santa exchange – and then surpassing that total one year later.

But Reddit eventually ended the Secret Santa subreddit, and although I enjoyed the time spent with that event, it reinforced my love/hate relationship with the social media platform.

Thankfully, this year I found a new Secret Santa online participation event.

This one is on the Mastodon platform.

For those who are not familiar with Mastodon, it’s a social network that has no one centralized oligarch owner. There’s no Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg who can manipulate an algorithm to force-feed you hate material or incessant targeted advertising.

And one of the Mastodon users runs a virtual Secret Santa exchange each year. You don’t have to purchase anything and physically mail it – you come up with a creative gift exchange based on someone’s profile and your unlimited imagination.

Okay … let’s try this. All I had to do to join this Secret Santa exchange was simply boost the original post.

And on Christmas Eve, I received my “Giftee” post, and notification of who was gifting me.

Later that evening, I received my Secret Santa gift.

And this person was able to determine the perfect gift for me. Even if it was, by the rules of the Mastodon Secret Santa exchange, only a virtual gift.

Thanks, my man. So long as Myles Garrett doesn’t reenact that little exchange he had with Mason Rudolph a few years ago, we’re all good.

Meanwhile, I came up with an exchange for my giftie. My giftie’s profile appreciated magic and creativity … let’s check my archive for a great photo for their wall … ooh, this one’s perfect.

See, nothing says “great holiday tradition” like sharing a print of Ran Out of Firewood.

A while later, my giftie sent me a card.

See, this is what makes social media on Mastodon so much fun.

And then, the organizer of the Secret Santa exchange also sent me their own version of a Secret Santa Chuck-tailored gift. Wow.

Wow, the opportunity to meet Louis Daguerre, one of the founding fathers of photography? Warm up that electrified phone booth, and let me tune my air guitar! Wyld Stallyns Rule!! Excellent!!

This was fun. This was an uplifting and really cool Secret Santa exchange. And if you like fun times like this – the way social media was meant to be – you need to sign up for a Mastodon account. It’s worth your time and you’ll enjoy the experience.

Besides, where else can you receive a virtual time machine and virtual season tickets to your favorite sports team? (looking around)