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Quote of the Day: Black Friday
“Into the breach, then. Against mobs of middle-aged moms and frightening harridans we shall prevail.” — Patricia Briggs
On Black Friday, instead of shopping, I spent the first half of the day playing with my cute toddler niece who calls me “Aunt Doodie.” For the second half of the day, I have planned fun stuff with several friends.
I went to a Black Friday sale once for my mom, several years ago. It was whatever year Game Cubes were the hot commodity in short supply, and Wal-Mart had a big sale. I had sat up all night, then left at 3:30 AM to drive an hour to a supercenter as our little hometown Wal-Mart wasn’t going to get any Game Cubes.
I was waiting to get into the supercenter just before 5 AM with everyone else. At 18, I was probably the youngest person there. I grabbed a cart and went in with a single mission: acquire Game Cube for my brother’s Christmas present.
When I found the display, there were 2 consoles left and an older lady was making a beeline for one of them, so I quickly snatched up the closest box and tossed it into my cart. I gave a little fist pump of victory and set off to grab some other items for my mom.
I had just made it to the next section of the store and started looking for an item on the shelf when a woman, approximately in her mid-40s, appeared. She started taking the Game Cube box out of my cart. I whipped around and slapped it out of her hands, then fixed her with a hard glare. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I demanded. “You took that Game Cube from me!” she replied. “Like hell I did!” said I, “I grabbed that off the display fair and square!”
She continued standing near the front of my cart, glaring at me. Then an exchange of epic swearing proportions broke out. She threatened to beat me up if I didn’t give her the console, I swore right back at her, then took off, running my cart over her foot while racing towards the checkout. I’d get the rest of the stuff from hometown Wal-Mart.
I made it back home safely, told Mom I’d never do another Black Friday sale, and why. To this day, over a decade later, I have never been back to a single Black Friday sale and never will.
Published in Group Writing
I have never in my life set foot in a store on Black Friday, and I puzzle over people who use the word “fun” to describe standing in line at 5 a.m. in subfreezing weather. Every year there are stories in the newspapers about the long lines and the shoppers going into murderous rages. Never have I seen a story that described any of the “great deals” that are supposedly going on inside. I strongly suspect that the prices aren’t any lower than they would be at any other sale. Of course, now that Amazon has come along I do all of my shopping on line.
We usually spend Black Friday decorating the tree.
For all you people who stand in line freezing at ungodly hours of the day, may I suggest a far more comfortable alternative? It’s called Amazon.com.
yubbut. . . Bezos is taking over the world! <only partly sarcastic; and, yes, I do shop “there”>
Never been to a Black Friday sale because there is nothing in this world that I want badly enough to subject myself to that experience.
I had to run to Lowe’s about mid-day, and was again surprised at the relative lack of traffic.
My mother never quite recovered from her first foray into Filene’s basement after Thanksgiving 1963. We’d been in country less than a month. People actually hurt each other, including the woman who was stabbed through the hand with an umbrella ferrule when she was reaching for something that another woman thought should be hers.
And this was in a kinder, gentler time.
Are you aware of how the nickname “Black Friday” came about? Started in Philly, and it started as a bit of black humor on the part of the cops assigned to duties on that day.