Unmasking ungrateful Xmas kids on Twitter

People's expectations tend to stretch far beyond anything that resembles reality. And the people whose expectations tend to stretch furthest beyond reality -- especially at Christmas -- are known by the colloquial term "the young."

We should, therefore, bow in solemn gratitude to writer Jon Hendren, who tears himself away from his own personal Xmas in order to retweet the messages of those who aren't happy with their gifts.

Yes, the young, the feckless, the occasionally heartless.

Here's a tweet -- retweeted by Hendren -- offered in advance of Santa wafting down a sooted chimney.

@annemcgerber groaned: "If I got a black iPad I'd probably kill myself." Yes, there's nothing more disappointing than getting a black iPad.

Take this from Alyssa Northcutt: "I'm really not getting an iPhone for Christmas...... #heartbreaking #depressing #WHYmom."

Oh, puppy. Perhaps a mom's love is conditional after all.

It wasn't just girls whining. Here's this from @jackthesphynx: "the only thing i really wanted for xmas was a macbook pro and i know i wont get one so whATEVER."

Whatever, indeed. Laptops are out anyway, Jack. I can't believe they didn't get you an iPad Mini, though.

And then there was Katie: "I told my dad that if he got me the Iphone 4s instead of 5 I'd throw it at him #PrincessProbz."

Princesses do have problems that are simply greater than the rest of us. We should all sympathize.

But after Santa's visit, the pain came down sharper than surgery without anesthetic.

Here's @leezadorio: "I didn't get an IPhone for Christmas time to roll up into a ball and die."

That seems like a slightly extreme reaction, poppet.

Panting close behind in the Ingratitude Marathon was a lady with the handle "Majesty." She wrote: "and my mom went directly against me. she asked me if I wanted the black or white iPad. I said white, of course. tell me why mine is black..?"

Oh, your Majesty. Perhaps your mom has been trying to tune you out for years and you just haven't noticed.

The trail of woe went on and on to the point that Hendren decided to post these tweets to his site Sad And Useless.

One of the latest samples came from the touchingly humane tweeter @jiawhite(:: "I feel bad for my mom cause I can tell she knows I'm pissed at her for giving me s*** ass presents."

I feel bad for your mom too, Jia.

However, one or two might feel aggrieved at Hendren's enthusiastic retweeting.

Take the Twitterer Finnick Odair. She tweeted: "Only got an iPad 2 god mum I wanted a f***** iPhone 5 f*** sake:///"

That little smiley thing at the end might suggest that she was annoyed... or just kidding.

Still Odair, who claims that the Hunger Games and HP are her life, managed to receive more opprobrium than most after Hendren's retweet of her words.

Just a few hours ago, she tweeted: "559 retweets, eight people telling me to kill myself, five death threats and several condemnations. Christmas Day 2012 has been a fun one."

Hendren had asked that his more than 49,000 followers don't take their own righteous frustrations out on the guilty (or innocent).

But this didn't prevent many tweeters from offering Odair nasty, vindictive tweets.

A similar fate befell Joseph Reyes, though his tweet might not have been humorous in intention.

He tweeted: "Well I guess I didnt get my much wanted iphone. F*** my damn life and every f****** thing it (sic)."

Perhaps these young people are still learning to cope with something that slightly older folks take in their stride. It's called disappointment. It seems to come along most weeks, most months.

Sometimes it feels like it hangs in our intestines every day.

I wonder if these kids will ever conclude, though, that Twitter might not be the best place to expose their acquisitive vulnerability.