If you're going to get a card for somebody you don't really care about, they should make cards that say that. "You're a friend of my wife's cousin–the hell with you." "We hardly know you. What did you expect, cash?"

Reiser’s joke skewers the social ritual of obligatory greeting cards—especially for distant acquaintances—by imagining brutally honest messages that match the sender’s true level of investment. The humor comes from the collision between the sentimental, formulaic language of commercial cards and the frank, transactional reality that sometimes motivates them (social pressure, reciprocity, gift expectations). Beneath the punchline is a critique of performative politeness: we often outsource emotion to prewritten scripts, even when the relationship is thin. The line also taps into modern cynicism about gift-giving etiquette, exposing how “thoughtfulness” can become a hollow convention.