It's here! Time to share the awesomeness. Well, let's back up a little first.

After having recently relocated to the States, and more precisely California, I noticed I still didn't have enough on my plate so I decided to register for Secret Santa. Smartest decision of my life?

Busy with my own gift to send, I admit to not (officially) obsessing too much about what I was going to get.

During that time, I also started to talk to a few people about Secret Santa, and Reddit. (One is the perfect segue to the other) If not to convert them, then the goal was to at least open their mind a little bit about the generosity that can be found on an online community. Although a few were still skeptics of what I ventured into, as soon as I pulled out a few stats (90 countries, 17,000+ participants), everyone was usually impressed enough to shut up.

Now back to Secret Santa. A few days after the match-ups were done, my Santa PMed me asking for my t-shirt size. Others warned me that this could be a diversion so everything was still wrapped in mystery.

Once my own package was sent to my giftee, I "calmly" waited around by hanging on the great RedditGifts gallery, marveling at all the amazing gifts that had been handed out. As a Reddit lurker with virtually no posts, I was afraid of getting something kind of generic. This fear was proved totally unfounded as you will now see.

The Secret Santa package arrived to my apartment a few days earlier than expected. I decided (or rather struggled) to wait until December 20th (my birthday) to open the package. Anticipation kicked in rather immediately.

Fast-forward to last Monday. I thought it'd be cool to open my package in front of some family members. Since none were in the same area as I, it was in front of a webcam and Skype (yay for technology), that I opened it.

As soon as I began unraveling the gift, I noticed that my Secret Santa had written a message on the inside flaps of the box: "I just wanted to let you know that much hippo lulz were had in the course of the requisite stalking!" This was followed by an epic hippo drawing. I can only assume that this was done in reference to 'Hippozor', a website I once participated in. If that is truly the case, then my hat is off to you, Secret Stalker!

Lo and behold, I find inside the package a hand-written letter wishing me a Happy Festivus with another awesome drawing, this time of the Reddit Alien (Christmas-style). Also in the letter was the following thoughtful message: "TheAma1: I’m sorry this is so late. Finals are fun, aren't they? Anyway, on behalf of your giftee and Reddit's Secret Santa community, I'd like to thank you for participating this year This exchange, and Reddit itself, wouldn't be what it is without people like you. I hope you enjoy your gift, and have a very happy Festivus! - Heidi (endeavourOV-105)"

At this point I'm more excited than ever to open the attached gifts. Yes, plural!

First, Heidi had discovered my love for Lost (only for the first four seasons mind you) and decided to gift me with an amazing "FOUND" T-shirt echoing the Lost logo.

It was then time to discover the second (carefully wrapped) present. Holy crap! It's...wait for it...a hand-made (!) Bender figurine out of aluminum foil! Simply epic. He's begging me to bite his shiny metal ass (not to be taken out of context). The attached pictures cannot do enough justice to the amazing work put into this amazingness. Mini-Bender will undeniably be put on one of the shelves above my computer.

All in all, I had an amazing experience this year with Secret Santa. Hopefully my giftee will have as much joy opening her package as I did with mine!

A thousand 'thank you' to Heidi/endeavourOV-105 for her hard work and kind words, and Happy Festivus to all!

P.S.: I hope you rocked those finals!