I was showing a young woman my collection of handmade German Christmas ornaments the other day.

“And these two,” I said, pointing (mit großem Stolz, I might add) to a large Nußknacker (nutcracker) and Räuchermann (incense smoker), “I got when I was an exchange student in Germany about twenty, no, thirty years ago.”

“Oh . . . So they’re vintage, then!” she said.

It was then that I took the nutcracker and bludgeoned the cheeky kid to death.