Nasty greetings cards. I was shocked

I like to receive cards and tend to leave them up for a week or so after birthdays etc. Then keep the special ones in a box in the wardrobe.

After my MIL died we found a box with all the cards the children had sent her over the years. From their first attempts at postcards to thoughtful birthday messages. She didn’t seem the least bit sentimental but they must have meant a lot to her.

I'm finding it difficult to buy family Christmas cards . Because of the situation we're going through at the moment the verses are just not appropriate.

Luckygirl, thank you, I have been wondering where to buy cards now the place I used to get them has closed and the National Trust shops no longer sell many of the sort I like. Can you give me any more names of websites?

6 of my grandchildren plus other family members and friends (including an 80th birthday) had birthdays in the first lockdown. I found some lovely cards on line from the Card Factory. There was an option to add a name to the front of many of them for no extra charge. They were very popular with the children. I was impressed with the quality,choice, price and efficiency of the service.

Bought all mine on eBay, son mum daughter neighbours sister etc. Lovely cards and all less than £1 each.

As was said, they're all quite depending on the type of 'humour' you are looking for-& type of person you are buying for- a colleague you are not a particularly close friend of, for example, may not be as accepting of some of the more 'dark humoured' style as a really close good friend whom you've known all your life? So just agree to disagree on some of these more 'nasty' cards & just stick to a more 'safe' 'bland' type of card then.Live & let live, lifes too short, etc. etc.?

Try Etsy for lovely hand made cards.

If you can't shop instore, why not browse charity shop websites? They are desperately short of funds this year and lots of lovely cards to chose from. Personally, I avoid Amazon as much as I can, I'm scared what their way of trading is doing long term to the rest of retail businesses.

I would rather have cards than presents. Especially love a card someone has made.

I make my own, this year will feature a dragon with Christmas embellishments wishing everyone a very happy Christmas in Welsh. I enjoy making them though don't much have time so draw them, print off then just put a little embellishment, this year I'm. Going to suggest people colour them themselves and email me a pic, lots of people say they are stressed, colouring is relaxing ?., Or they can just bin it!

You see hetty I find zoom, phone and text messages so cold compared to a card you can never pick them up handle them look at them again and think of that person I have my Dads last birthday card to me on my bedroom wall I know he didn’t buy it himself as the last few years he didn’t get to the shops but he handled it, his writing is there and his message is there for me to read whenever I want a little bit of him with me
So although I don’t think of myself as elderly or overly sentimental I suppose in your eyes I am

I have a box of special cards from people mostly family and close friends that every now and then I ll open and have a look, a feeling, a memory you cant get that with a phone call

I make all my own cards birthday and Christmas, some kind of painting or design, some of my friends have told me they keep them too and that’s nice to think I m still with them

I buy cards online from artists. There are companies like the Gallery on the Usk (www.galleryontheusk.co.uk) which hosts the Blank Card Company, and also individual artists have websites from which many sell cards. Lovely cards. I wait till they have a sale and then buy a batch of cards to last me the year.

We don't 'do' cards, except for a few elderly, sentimental relatives and neighbours. I'm fascinated, though, by the meanings and significance they assign to a 'nice' greetings card. It's just a piece of paper, after all. It's a dying tradition in our family.

We do text messages, phone and Zoom calls instead now. We email little jokes, too, often rude, politically incorrect - or deliberately 'not nice' as you'd say, Lizbethann55 - the worse, the better!

I completely agree Lizbethann.
Last year I was looking on Amazon for a leaving card for a male colleague. He is a quiet, mild mannered person, so a humorous one wouldn’t have been appropriate for him.

However, I was similarly shocked at how many vulgar and unpleasant options there were. Lots of ‘F* off, we’re glad you’re going’ and ‘You're f***ing abandoning us, at last’.
I can’t understand it ... it seems passive aggressive or just plain nasty to me.

Strange world ...

The "quote" is more Jimmy Carr, who said "If it’s funny enough, you can get away with anything"
in this interview
www.standard.co.uk/go/london/comedy/jimmy-carr-interview-people-tell-me-my-own-jokes-it-s-one-of-my-favourite-things-a3103531.html

I have got some cards in a local card shop which I’ve been happy with but I have bought some on Amazon when I can’t find what I want. I agreed that some on line are just awful and I would not be happy to receive them. The crudity wouldn’t bother me but the hurtful words would

Definitely not Wilde, neither sentiment expressed or language are right.

I find its quite difficult to buy an appropriate card Lizbethann55 they seem to veer from sickeningly sweet to crass and vulgar.
I have a good sense of humour sometimes on the black side but I do struggle with some of these cards. I find the best cards in independent shops moving away from the big chains.

welbeck

are you sure that's oscar wilde; it doesn't sound quite right for him.

No, it doesn't sound right at all!

one card i liked announced in bold capitals on the cover, this is an adult birthday card.
inside was a picture of a miniature card, and the words, and this is a baby one.

are you sure that's oscar wilde; it doesn't sound quite right for him.

Personally I'm with Oscar Wilde

'you can get away with anything as long as it's funny'

I totally accept that humour is subjective. I have a very dark sense of humour which is shared with my adult sons, husband and a couple of very old friends. We send each other the most terrible cards/mugs/fridge magnets. It's puerile and naughty and funny.
It's all in the context.

Could you give examples?