2. help wanted; Eve MacSweeney puts her extralong list in the hands of a professional.(StyleChic's Alyson Scott)

Byline: Eve Macsweeney

I know many lucky people who have a handful of holiday gifts to buy. My total must be at least 50 by the time I factor in my extended family that gathers for Christmas lunch, including uncles, aunts, cousins-even a cousin's daughter (what's that, a cousin once removed?). And then there are friends, long-suffering baby-sitters, my assistant, my five godchildren, the super, the panhandler on the corner, and anyone else toward whom I feel guilt or gratitude.

I enjoy shopping for gifts, especially when I travel. I make daring and mostly successful moves, like buying people clothes, and regret gift-wrapping services because I love to choose papers and ribbons. Or rather, loved. With two young kids and a busy job, the joy of wrapping can lose its luster when you're doing it at 2:00 a.m. Recently I've also noticed a certain atrophy creeping into my efforts. I find that I get fixed ideas about the right gift for somebody-how many varieties of blue scarves can I buy my sister-in-law, for instance? (Blue is her favorite color.) And how many more books on Arctic exploration, far-flung travel, and death-defying adventure can I find for my brother, a surgeon whose tastes run to extreme physical challenge?

This season, in order to save time and break out of a rut, I enlisted the services of a personal shopper, and what's more, I outsourced her. Alyson Scott runs StyleChic, a Los Angeles-based firm that offers closet makeovers to locals and a six-hour shopping package for visiting clients, as well as a Web-based service for people like me. A former celebrity stylist with a background in magazines, Alyson launched her company last year, using her contacts to sidestep wait lists and source unusual finds and undiscovered boutiques. The shopping day costs $1,800, which, when you add up the designer discounts that are part of the deal, often cancels itself out for big spenders. For other services, she charges $250 an hour.

"It's all about getting people what they want," she says. "The other day I had a call at 5:00 p.m. from a woman from Cairo who wanted a Balenciaga bag in blue, which wasn't available in any of the stores here. She was leaving the next morning. I had the bag driven by town car from Vegas and delivered to her at LAX." A pair of Saudi princesses were so thrilled with their shopping trip that they're flying Alyson to Riyadh to revamp their wardrobes. I was happy to hear that she also caters to clients on a budget.

Most of Alyson's customers fill out a questionnaire on her Web site. I sat on my balcony while on a fall vacation in Greece and thumb-typed her an E-mail on my Treo. I explained that several of my recipients fell into the impossible-to-buy-for category because they are either the person who has everything (i.e., super_expensive and rarefied tastes) or the person who has nothing (i.e., ascetic types who say there isn't a thing they need). I gave her ten categories, with mini-profiles, such as "best friend: has exquisite taste, lives with Japanese antiques, wears YSL" and "sister-in-law: very granola, likes blue." Time expenditure: five minutes. I was curious to see what she would do with these skimpy descriptions. Surely it takes more than a couple of words to explain the intricacies of someone's personality, especially all the difficult people I know?

Apparently not. Alyson must be something of a clairvoyant because three days later, an E-mail arrived with several suggestions for different people at different prices, many of which ...