I like to think that my husband is a super-special individual. Wonderfully unique, full of charming idiosyncrasies, and just an extraordinary one-in-a-million man.

But when it comes to shopping, HE IS SUCH A TYPICAL GUY.

It’s a cliché, I know. Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus. Men are Hunters, and Women are Collectors.

And there’s nothing like CHRISTMAS SHOPPING, to remind me of how different my husband and I are. That’s right. I love shopping and he hates it.

When buying ordinary groceries, he will deliberately shop at the little tiny local corner store, where there is less variety, and often higher prices. He doesn’t want choice. He wants LESS CHOICE.

And every shopping experience to an actual shopping mall is planned like a military operation, where brave men could be lost in combat.

For him, the shopping centre is enemy territory. The mission is to extract the pre-identified objects, by navigating the shortest possible route, without being delayed or distracted by anything else. And this is on a typical weekday.

Asking him to go to a shopping mall, a week before Christmas, to buy presents for in-laws, nieces and nephews, is like sending him on a suicide mission into the very depths of hell, to dance with the devil.

He won’t even go unless it is already determined what the object is, and exactly where it is located. For him, “going to the shops to see if I can find something for so and so…” means that the mission has a critical intelligence weakness, and has to be cancelled.

Even once he has agreed to the “mission”, he will go to extraordinary lengths to be in and out in just minutes. He will plan to arrive at the shopping centre a few minutes before it opens, to beat crowds and avoid queues.

And there has to be a “back-up” plan too.

What happens if the designated Christmas present cannot be found at the designated location in the designated time? Well, I would just wander around the shops a little longer, or phone a friends for suggestions while having a coffee.

But he would completely abort the mission, evacuate the territory and call in a nuclear air strike.

So, you guessed it…we almost never go shopping together.

And we NEVER EVER go shopping together in the festive season.

Like I said, it’s a cliché…but it’s a TRUE cliché.