The "it's efficient" line kills me because that's exactly the problem, efficiency is not the same as good. What nobody at that table probably said is that corporate CEO villains are a get out of jail free card for the writer. If the bad guy is just greedy, you never have to sit down and ask yourself why he's like that or what he tells himself when he looks in the mirror. Real people who do bad stuff almost always have a story going in their head that makes it okay. Drop the suit and the boardroom and you'd be forced to write that story.

Doesn't it depend on whether you actually did the thing?

But have you ever asked yourself why the brick bugged you so much? A joke gift is only a joke if both people are in on it, and it sounds like he was the only one laughing. That said, I see it a little different than you do. Your cousin got a used tire with no car to go with it, which is just plain useless, but a brick at least has some weight to it, so the fitness tool thing wasn't totally made up. The real issue isn't the gift, it's that he made a show of it in front of your whole family and then laughed at his own joke for 5 minutes straight. Would your sister even laugh if you handed him a bag of nothing next year? That's the question worth asking.

Aldi brand cheese changed my mind after years of swearing by Kraft.

Who hasn't met a guy at the DMV who's got it all figured out, right? He's out there rolling the dice on an 8 month old temp tag while you did the responsible thing and dropped $300 like a chump. I bet his plan is real solid right up until a cop pulls him over and he's standing there explaining his master plan on the shoulder. Getting away with something for 8 months doesn't make it legal, it just means he's been lucky, and lucky runs out eventually. You paid for peace of mind, he's paying in anxiety every time he sees a cop car.