It’s not too late to order either candy or flowers for your honey, whom you forgot about until you looked at the calendar and saw it was Feb. 9! Here are a couple of our picks: A chocolate strawberry dipping kit from Gotfruit.com, a wonderful way to give a juicy chocolate treat. A Valentine Snack Tower from Hickory Farms that includes pink and white yogurt covered pretzels, apples and pears (No, there’s no sausage in that one, but you can order the Hickory Farms signature sausage packaged with Valentine pretzel sticks. If you’re so inclined.) Hickory Farms advises that you have until Sunday to order for VD delivery.
Aside from chocolates, how about a cake? Bake Me A Wish has a red chocolate cake that’s delectably encased fluffy white cream cheese icing. Very Valentines Day. Cakes are delivered the next day for $14.95 shipping, not bad, considering the freshness imperative.

January, as we all know, is the “white sale” month. But that outdated term barely covers it anymore. We’re not just talking about bland everyday sheets and towels, but all sorts of textiles and decor items on discount. Pillows, most notably, seem to be propping up sale signs everywhere. Bombay Company has pillows and silk window panels on clearance, and to our surprise some of the panels at 108″ long would actually fit today’s windows. How convenient is that?

Or wait until next season. Yes, you’re out of cash from holidays. Still, January is the best time to buy a coat. You can wear it for the rest of the winter; the selections have not been totally plundered by the masses and the prices are about as good as they get. Here’s a tip — you might even find a trench or car coat to extend beyond the snowy season, thereby better justifying the expense. We like the belted styles on winter jackets and trench coats at Tommy Hilfiger, though we’re still waiting for some prices to drop. Exhibit A above.

If, like us, you find yourself in a high def mood after receiving games and DVDs for Christmas, don’t despair. The electronics sales continue. The Samsung HD LCD TV (can you string more acronyms?) above is just one of many choices lingering as retailers push promotions into the New Year. At 32 inches, this TV is no one’s idea of a big-screen (at least not in this century) but it is suitable for bedrooms, sitting areas, smaller game areas etc. It’s got the wide-screen ratio, a slim body and it’s priced at the moment at Circuit City for under $1,300. Want to eek out another 5 inches? Check out the 37 inch HD, LCD at Philips Direct, priced at under $1500.

Not to be anti-climatic about it, but as your holiday wallet thins, you may notice that seasonal celebrating causes your waistline to do the opposite. If something about all that food and spending makes you want to simplify and possibly even exercise, look to Gaiam, a green lifestyle website that offers yoga, exercise and meditation accoutrements (as well as $4.95 shipping pre-holiday shipping). We found this mini-trampoline. It comes with a DVD that promises you a low-impact cardio workout that will tighten your glutes and leg muscles. Could this be a way to jump for joy after the holidays?

Train sets, boys (and sometimes girls) and Christmas. It’s a tradition and it’s not too late. Panicked parents can still order toys online and select shipping options that should bring the bounty in on time. And prices are getting better. This one-stop train set — table, tracks and town — is $149 at Amazon and with free shipping it is estimated to arrive Dec. 22. It isn’t Brio or Thomas Tank, but then will your 3-year-old really care? If you think the little master must have the top brands (and we pity you when he’s 14 and needs a video iPod), Amazon also carries the Thomas Tank line and its many, many accoutrements, like the Thomas play tent shown above. Come to think of it, those Thomas train engines are pretty cute with their quaint faces and their alternately perky and grumpy personalities.

Some new shopping search engines are taking aim at the existing big shopping search engines by bucking the trend of featuring paid advertisers. Instead they display the entire panoply of product choices on the web. One of these new companies, TheFind.com, seeks to out-Google us with offerings. We tried searching for one of our Christmas list items, a crossbow, and sure enough the beta version of The Find, found 6591 items in 534 stores (by its own calculations). On page 10 of the search results, the items were still entirely relevant, and you know page 10 of any web search is often floating away like flotsam on a river of tangents. Don’t know much about their technology, but we like the image thumbnails that are so easy to scan. And the pop-up info available for each find. Impressive. (Btw, that crossbow, $600+ at MC Sports, is the real deal, for hunters, not for kids.)

We like dual-function appliances. They eat up less countertop or cabinet space. Beyond that, they’re just more fun, like this blender/food processor by Cuisinart at Macy’s. But….we’re aware that some functions just weren’t meant to be combined. Like the electric blanket-massager we ran across once. Seemed like a lot of colliding protons in duelling electro-magnetic fields…which wouldn’t be too relaxing. So, we were glad to see the mostly good reviews (all good, if you remove the hearing-sensitive woman who didn’t like the noise) of this little chopper/blender. Good brand. Good price. Good last-minute get for Christmas. Chop, chop.