Looking for a gift that keeps on giving? Consider a giant disease microbe

Good news: Now you can give people sexually transmitted diseases without even touching them.

And you don’t have to do it the way people used to think you could, back when they were scared of getting STDs: You don’t have to leave the microbe on a toilet seat, although you could. You also could leave it on the couch, or the loveseat, or the recliner, or the front passenger’s seat of the car. Or you could leave it on a box on the front porch, ring the doorbell and run.

How do you give people STDs without touching them?

By stuffing them. Stuffing the STDs, I mean: They’re available as stuffed animals now.

Where do you get a plush, cuddly sexually transmitted disease?

From “Drew Oliver’s GIANT Microbes – A Million Times Actual Size!”

Online at www.giantmicrobes.com, it says, “Having a relationship with these depraved microorganisms can be hard to handle. Our adorable and delightful GIANTmicrobes will help you stay informed, act smart and raise awareness about STDs.”

GIANT Microbes does not specialize solely in STDs. You can get other diseases there, too, and also body parts, and some stuffed stuff that bodies emit. You can get Spanish Flu, smallpox, celiac disease, an STD four-pack, “Plagues From History” or the “Themed Box Super Bundle,” plus mucus, poop and scabs.

If your local theater group’s putting on a production of “The Wizard of Oz,” you can get a stuffed brain for the scarecrow and a heart for the tin man.

Speaking of simple gifts it’s too late to get, your just hearing about this now is a shame, isn’t it? It’s too bad you didn’t know about it back in early February, before Valentine’s Day.

A truly special gift would have been a lovable microbe that rhymed with someone’s name. You could have got syphilis for Phyllis, chlamydia for Lydia, herpes for … Xerxes, and gonorrhea for … um …. Madea.

You might not want to give your spouse an STD, but just think: If you have a young daughter, giving her a plush microbe could spark an interest in pursuing a rewarding career in healthcare, science and technology, and in keeping a safe distance from boys.

The opportunities for ending relationships are obvious: You could wrap the stuffed STD up for those you’re cutting loose, and when they opened the box and saw what they got, they also could find a note that said it’s not the first time you gave it to them.

As for the stuffed body parts, consider this: Were you getting divorced, then along with the house and the car and the alimony, you could give your ex-wife a stuffed heart, and tell her to go squeeze that, too.

Or you could give your ex-husband a brain, and tell him to stick it in his ear, because if it goes all the way in, then he’ll have one for a change.

If you’ve reached the point that you just hope you never see these people ever again, the possibilities multiply like gut worms:

You can give them bedbugs, Black Death, botulism, chickenpox, cholera, cold sores, crab lice, Dengue Fever, diarrhea, E. coli, Ebola, gangrene, leaches, listeria, Kissing Disease, malaria, measles, pneumonia, salmonella, ticks, rabies and (particularly cutting) mange.

To decorate public health clinics, sex-education classrooms and cheap motels, GIANT microbes offers visual aids you can download, such as an STD info-graphic with fun facts about various ailments. Did you know gonorrhea’s nickname “the clap” is from “clapier,” the French word for a brothel? Or that trichomoniasis, spread by a protozoan parasite, is the most common non-viral STD?

You also can get a “Find the STDs in the city” poster depicting a seedy street scene in which 36 microbes are pictured, and you have to try to get all of them.

Christmas is not right around the corner yet, but don’t let it sneak up on you before you get a GIANT Microbes Christmas ornament five-pack, or a Christmas ornament 12-pack, or a Christmas mini-microbe stocking stuffer.

It’s the gift that says: You’re in my heart. You’re in my soul. You’re in my test results.

This story was originally published April 15, 2018 at 4:03 PM with the headline "Looking for a gift that keeps on giving? Consider a giant disease microbe."