El Hubbo and I decided this year to check out the Black Friday sales. Being as we were in Amarillo, and being as there were major outlet stores readily available (not the case at his parent's house in Floydada), and being as we were really wanting a Home Theater System with a Blu Ray player, we decided that we would brave the Black Friday crowd to shop the sales late Thursday night. (We really should have caught on to the ridiculousness of this concept at that point.)
We donned our tennis shoes and sweats - did some pre-shopping stretching and shadow boxing and prepared for battle.
We figured we would be smart and slide on down to the Walmart just down the street. You see, two years ago, we had similar bouts of insanity and had driven by the Toys R Us - we saw the line and that cured us of our mental illness. But, we then drove by the Walmart only to see no one there. We gleefully shopped to our heart's content and were able to hear our voices echoing off the interior walls. No lines, no waiting, no competition.
Not so this year. We arrived at Walmart and then had to drive down the block to Lowe's hardware. We then hiked across the frozen tundra to the store. The muttering under our breath had already begun. "Who's idea was this?" "Are these people crazy?" "What could this many people really need at 10 p.m. on Thanksgiving night?" "Why did you drag me out here?" We muscled our way into the store and through the aisles. I couldn't help noticing that everyone was carrying around a box of tupperware. That's right. The most popular sales item at the Walmart on Thanksgiving night was TUPPERWARE. Of course what we were wanting was at the back of the store. At one point we got separated as Darin cut to the left, and some old lady with a deep chest freezer in her basket cut me off.
We reunited in electronics and looked at all the boxes and came to the realization that we really had no clue what we were looking for. We shrugged our shoulders and decided to make our way to the toy section as my mom had asked us to look for a couple things - you know, "while we were out."
Walmart, in it's infinite wisdom, decided to stagger the items they would release on sale. The poor, hapless employees were left basically defenseless against the angry mob. Their backs shoved up against stacks of toys and other items, they tried helplessly to keep the shrink wrap intact until the magic hour. The mob would not be denied, however, and they stampeded every blue-vested human in their quest for Barbies and basketballs. (I am constantly amazed at the popularity of Barbie. I absolutely despise her and think she is a horrible role model for young women. If you would like my extended commentary on her many shortcomings, let me know and I'll draft up a blog on her. However, she was a very popular item, as would be anything representing a female with impossible measurements and the IQ of a coffee table.)
We squeezed our way down an aisle to the LeapFrog paraphernalia. I was checking out the games when I overheard one guy lamenting that not only was Walmart sold out of LeapPads, they were out online as well. I resisted the urge to stick my tongue out and say, "Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha - I bought mine two months ago! Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah." (SPOILER ALERT - please don't tell my children they are getting LeapPads for Christmas.) I can be incredibly mature when I choose to be.
I grabbed a couple toys for mom, and headed with El Hubbo to the line. The line to checkout was stretched from the front of the store all the way to the Garden department. El Hubbo looks at me and asks, "Are those on sale?" I said, "No." We dropped them and headed for the exit.
We felt like defeatede amateurs as we left the store empty-handed. But, both of us being rather determined individuals, we decided we'd go check out the lines at Best Buy and Target to see if we could get lucky. Surprisingly, the lines at Best Buy were only wrapped once around the building, and there was parking available in the lot. We decided to risk it.
This was at 11:30 p.m. Best Buy had resolutely decided to not open on Thanksgiving and were forcing us to wait in the cold and dark until 12:01. Fortunately, we found ourselves in line behind the Nerd Herd. (If you haven't seen the show, Chuck, you are missing out.) These fine young male specimens could be overheard discussing the finer points of the popular video games, and how hot some of the female characters were. El Hubbo commented that it would take very understanding girlfriends to let catches like these out on their own at night.
During our wait in line, El Hubbo's mind was working overtime on possible business ventures. He just knew he could make good money selling hot chocolate to people waiting in line. As soon as he voiced this grand idea, a guy came by selling hot chocolate for $3 a cup. El Hubbo says, "See? What did I tell you?" I reply, "Yep, day late and dollar short, just as usual." I couldn't quite understand what he muttered under his breath. Pretty sure I don't want to. But, I have to admit that they guy seemed to be making pretty good money - but he was a poor business manager. At one point someone asked him what he'd charge for 5 cups of hot chocolate - he told them $7. Granted I am an Aggie and I was not a math major, but even I can figure out that he probably marked that down way too far.
We work our way slowly around the building and as we approach the corner closest to the door of the store, El Hubbo says, "I'm tired, let's go." After waiting in the cold and listening to the Nerd Herd for half an hour, my only response was, "Don't make me kick you in your good leg." We made it in and hustled back to the home theater section. Why we thought we would know any more about what we were looking at then as opposed to what we were looking at one hour before in Walmart, I don't know. But, after some quick searching on the internet on our phones, we thought we found what we needed and proceeded to try to find the end of the line for the checkout. We ran into El Hubbo's brother (who is a regular at the Best Buy Black Friday fiasco and therefore certifiably nuts) and visited with him through the line.
Proud of ourselves for not leaving the store empty-handed, we loaded up our purchase and started for home. Or mom and dad's home, anyway. I noticed that Ulta was open as we passed by. El Hubbo got very excited, and no doubt was still buzzing from his Best Buy experience, and whipped into the parking lot. He was convinced he needed some perfume, or "cologne" as male-types call it. It is surprising how many other people were also very concerned with needing odiferous liquids at 1:30 in the morning. El Hubbo experienced success again and I do believe had I not said, "you are out of money, proceed directly home" he might have tried his luck at a few more stores.
So, that was it. Our Black Friday experience. How did Al Gore Save Christmas, you ask? Well, the rest of the story is that we got our home theater purchase to our house three days later, unboxed it and realized it did not have wireless rear speakers, which was the primary feature we were searching for. So, we boxed it back up to be returned to the store. We got on the internet, found what we really wanted and ordered it off the website to be shipped directly to us. Yep, 3 hours spent in stores fighting crowds on Black Friday, and we end up ordering it off the internet anyway.
So, a belated Thanksgiving "thanks" goes out to Al Gore - for without him we would not have internet, and without internet I would have to go into training for next year's Black Friday.
We donned our tennis shoes and sweats - did some pre-shopping stretching and shadow boxing and prepared for battle.
We figured we would be smart and slide on down to the Walmart just down the street. You see, two years ago, we had similar bouts of insanity and had driven by the Toys R Us - we saw the line and that cured us of our mental illness. But, we then drove by the Walmart only to see no one there. We gleefully shopped to our heart's content and were able to hear our voices echoing off the interior walls. No lines, no waiting, no competition.
Not so this year. We arrived at Walmart and then had to drive down the block to Lowe's hardware. We then hiked across the frozen tundra to the store. The muttering under our breath had already begun. "Who's idea was this?" "Are these people crazy?" "What could this many people really need at 10 p.m. on Thanksgiving night?" "Why did you drag me out here?" We muscled our way into the store and through the aisles. I couldn't help noticing that everyone was carrying around a box of tupperware. That's right. The most popular sales item at the Walmart on Thanksgiving night was TUPPERWARE. Of course what we were wanting was at the back of the store. At one point we got separated as Darin cut to the left, and some old lady with a deep chest freezer in her basket cut me off.
We reunited in electronics and looked at all the boxes and came to the realization that we really had no clue what we were looking for. We shrugged our shoulders and decided to make our way to the toy section as my mom had asked us to look for a couple things - you know, "while we were out."
Walmart, in it's infinite wisdom, decided to stagger the items they would release on sale. The poor, hapless employees were left basically defenseless against the angry mob. Their backs shoved up against stacks of toys and other items, they tried helplessly to keep the shrink wrap intact until the magic hour. The mob would not be denied, however, and they stampeded every blue-vested human in their quest for Barbies and basketballs. (I am constantly amazed at the popularity of Barbie. I absolutely despise her and think she is a horrible role model for young women. If you would like my extended commentary on her many shortcomings, let me know and I'll draft up a blog on her. However, she was a very popular item, as would be anything representing a female with impossible measurements and the IQ of a coffee table.)
We squeezed our way down an aisle to the LeapFrog paraphernalia. I was checking out the games when I overheard one guy lamenting that not only was Walmart sold out of LeapPads, they were out online as well. I resisted the urge to stick my tongue out and say, "Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha - I bought mine two months ago! Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah." (SPOILER ALERT - please don't tell my children they are getting LeapPads for Christmas.) I can be incredibly mature when I choose to be.
I grabbed a couple toys for mom, and headed with El Hubbo to the line. The line to checkout was stretched from the front of the store all the way to the Garden department. El Hubbo looks at me and asks, "Are those on sale?" I said, "No." We dropped them and headed for the exit.
We felt like defeatede amateurs as we left the store empty-handed. But, both of us being rather determined individuals, we decided we'd go check out the lines at Best Buy and Target to see if we could get lucky. Surprisingly, the lines at Best Buy were only wrapped once around the building, and there was parking available in the lot. We decided to risk it.
This was at 11:30 p.m. Best Buy had resolutely decided to not open on Thanksgiving and were forcing us to wait in the cold and dark until 12:01. Fortunately, we found ourselves in line behind the Nerd Herd. (If you haven't seen the show, Chuck, you are missing out.) These fine young male specimens could be overheard discussing the finer points of the popular video games, and how hot some of the female characters were. El Hubbo commented that it would take very understanding girlfriends to let catches like these out on their own at night.
During our wait in line, El Hubbo's mind was working overtime on possible business ventures. He just knew he could make good money selling hot chocolate to people waiting in line. As soon as he voiced this grand idea, a guy came by selling hot chocolate for $3 a cup. El Hubbo says, "See? What did I tell you?" I reply, "Yep, day late and dollar short, just as usual." I couldn't quite understand what he muttered under his breath. Pretty sure I don't want to. But, I have to admit that they guy seemed to be making pretty good money - but he was a poor business manager. At one point someone asked him what he'd charge for 5 cups of hot chocolate - he told them $7. Granted I am an Aggie and I was not a math major, but even I can figure out that he probably marked that down way too far.
We work our way slowly around the building and as we approach the corner closest to the door of the store, El Hubbo says, "I'm tired, let's go." After waiting in the cold and listening to the Nerd Herd for half an hour, my only response was, "Don't make me kick you in your good leg." We made it in and hustled back to the home theater section. Why we thought we would know any more about what we were looking at then as opposed to what we were looking at one hour before in Walmart, I don't know. But, after some quick searching on the internet on our phones, we thought we found what we needed and proceeded to try to find the end of the line for the checkout. We ran into El Hubbo's brother (who is a regular at the Best Buy Black Friday fiasco and therefore certifiably nuts) and visited with him through the line.
Proud of ourselves for not leaving the store empty-handed, we loaded up our purchase and started for home. Or mom and dad's home, anyway. I noticed that Ulta was open as we passed by. El Hubbo got very excited, and no doubt was still buzzing from his Best Buy experience, and whipped into the parking lot. He was convinced he needed some perfume, or "cologne" as male-types call it. It is surprising how many other people were also very concerned with needing odiferous liquids at 1:30 in the morning. El Hubbo experienced success again and I do believe had I not said, "you are out of money, proceed directly home" he might have tried his luck at a few more stores.
So, that was it. Our Black Friday experience. How did Al Gore Save Christmas, you ask? Well, the rest of the story is that we got our home theater purchase to our house three days later, unboxed it and realized it did not have wireless rear speakers, which was the primary feature we were searching for. So, we boxed it back up to be returned to the store. We got on the internet, found what we really wanted and ordered it off the website to be shipped directly to us. Yep, 3 hours spent in stores fighting crowds on Black Friday, and we end up ordering it off the internet anyway.
So, a belated Thanksgiving "thanks" goes out to Al Gore - for without him we would not have internet, and without internet I would have to go into training for next year's Black Friday.
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