#5: Observation is a big one, but observation without any confirmation can also lead astray. Say I borrow your car, observe it is dirty, and decide to take it to the car wash. In 90% of the cases, I’ll have used observation to serve you well and please you. In 8% of the cases, you’ll be irritated at the implicit accusation that you’re too cheap or filthy to take care of it yourself – in which case you ought to learn the skill of receiving gifts well. I’m not sure confirmation would have helped here. In the remaining 2%, there’s a leak in the window or the roof or somewhere else, and I’ll have done damage to your car. These are the cases where it would be good to ask beforehand – a quick phone call from the car wash parking lot – if cleaning the car is a good idea. So, observation goes a long way toward good service, but observation does not lead to immediate certainty. If I know you to be a stickler about keeping things clean, I will be more likely to call for confirmation before washing the car. If I know you to not care so much for appearance or maintenance, I will be less likely to call.

There are also acts of service that don’t work simply because the person serving does them on his own terms. If you don’t clean up my desk the way I’d want it, if you don’t wash the dishes well, if you decide to toss my natty T-shirt that I’m attached to, if I send you to buy wood for a DIY project and you pick a different type from what I specified because you are convinced it’s better, if you improve my computer without telling me, I probably won’t be happy, and the act of service will have lost its purpose.

So, it is sometimes good to ask how to serve, especially if like me you’re not a natural. And Heather is right, it is sometimes good to request a certain service, for service done because it was requested and despite one’s natural inclination is a big deal. But requesting comes with a risk. If my attitude in serving you is wrong, if I serve in a way that continually reminds you that I’m only doing it because you’ve requested it, or if I flat-out call your request silly and ignore it, you’ll regret having asked.

#5 – My worries exactly. The same holds true for gifts. There’s something depressing about Christmas lists (and Amazon wish lists and wedding registries). On the one hand, they’re a blessing, because you know your gift will be appreciated for itself and not just “because so-and-so gave it to me” or worse, received with the same joy Ron Weasley exhibits when receiving his Christmas sweater. But (pleasant) surprise adds immeasurably to the joy of giving and receiving, be in gifts or acts of service, and that’s hard to come by if you’ve asked what the person wants. And there’s something sterile about “gift giving” when you buy something from my list, and I buy something from yours, and we exchange them — when we each could have bought what we wanted and saved the wrapping paper and postage.

Ideally, a gift reflects the personality of the giver as well as the recipient, and is something the recipient would enjoy but is unlikely to get for himself. But this requires a lot more time, thought, and effort than choosing from a list; more importantly, it requires knowing the person well enough to anticipate what would be a pleasant surprise, just as you know that Janet would be more pleased by a swept floor than an alphabetized CD rack. And few of us know that well the people for whom we buy gifts, because we are separated from their daily lives. Hence the reason for gifts of money — also sterile, but almost always useful and appreciated.

(Note: no matter what list it shows up on, you’re not getting #1 from us for Christmas. Sorry.)

#6 — I would have thought a “chemtrail” was what your alcohol-soaked informant was leaving behind him. Ditto smokers, even if they only smoke outdoors.