So do you have all of your Christmas shopping done? Got everything on your list? Are you one of those wonderfully organized people who wrapped the last present and stored it in the closet for Christmas before Labor Day? If so, well good, good, goody for you. I am not one of you, and never have been. I tell myself each year I will do more, and do it earlier. But I cannot.

I can’t shop early. I can’t stand buying Christmas gifts until the air is cold, and there’s either rain or show falling. No holiday lights means no Christmas shopping in my world. I don’t shop early. I don’t shop late. I shop very, very, very late. I’ve been seen doing my Christmas shopping on Dec. 24, Christmas Eve. In fact, very, very late on Christmas Eve.

It’s not that I don’t know what to get. I usually know that, for my wife at least, a couple of months before December. Gifts for others, not so much. But actually getting out and doing it is another thing. I can’t buy Christmas presents while wearing shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, when the air is still matching my body temperature. It’s just wrong.

Same with buy Christmas presents while the Halloween costumes are still on the racks, or the stores are advertising pumpkin pies with yams and turkey stuffing ingredients. It has to wait until the other holidays are passed, and the focus is entirely on Christmas, and only Christmas.

Who wants to think about warm woolen mittens while watching the All-Star game in July? Or even while watching the World Series (which may be in late October, and yes, cold but still before Halloween)? And can you honestly consider holiday presents and hum “White Christmas” while walking around in a T-shirt when the temperature is still in the 80s? It’s just wrong, on so many levels.

I have a problem even shopping for Christmas presents during daylight hours. It’s supposed to be a winter event. Cold, or at least cool. Dark, as in the dead of winter. The only illumination should be the stars, or the bright lights, even stop lights, blinking a bright red and green, as the shoppers rush home with their presents. (Apologies to the composer of “Silver Bells.”)

So this year, like every year past, I have one or two gifts already laid away in the closet at home. But until the air freezes, the light in the sky dims at 4:30 p.m. and the store lights guide my way, I’ll wait.

Then the Chamber of Commerce, together with the wreaths on the street lamps, the music in the stores and on the radio, the stars in the sky as they approach (or pass) the Winter’s Solstice, will beckon me onward. Come, celebrate the season with your cash, your card, and spirit on this last night. Urgency requires you shop now. You have not another day to wait, for tomorrow is Christmas.

So if you’re like me, I will see you, list in hand, on a cold winter’s night. It will be Christmas Eve. Again.

Doug Rhoades lives in Kelseyville, Calif.