Thanksgiving and Black Friday

Thanksgiving was different this year for me, but it was a good one. Instead of being with any family this year, I spent the day with one of my best friends. I went down to Joshua's house where he was cooking dinner, and I brought some pumpkin pie to share. The afternoon was spent watching The Exorcism of Emily Rose, and How It's Made. Dinner consisted of a roasted stuffed chicken, green bean casserole, and mac and cheese. It was excellent, and there was enough left over to take for lunch at work the next day.

After dinner Joshua went to nap, and I headed home to grab some things since we had made plans to hit the Black Friday sales. I got back and watched some TV for a while before Joshua woke up. We had dessert, and then started watching The Return. We got so bored with it after 40 mins. that we ended up turning it off. Around 10 I crashed out since I planned to be up by 2 AM to get in line for Black Friday.

I was woken up at 2 AM, and by 2:30, we were standing at a Best Buy in Alexandria. We estimate that there were about 150 people in front of us. This year I wasn't trying to score one of those overly insane deals on some hot item that people get into fights over. The item I wanted was the new Nintendo DS Lite Gold Bundle. If you know me, you know that I am a Zelda geek, hands down. There were a few stores offering it for Black Friday, and it was not only at that price for a few hours, but it was that way through the weekend. Best Buy sweetened the deal by offering a DS Lite Starter Kit for free if you bought this particular DS.

So we're out there, and it's a bit chilly, people are getting in line and then getting one of their friends to go over to the local IHOP and get coffee or whatever. 3 AM rolls around and they're handing out tickets for various items. The only tickets that made it back our way were for the GPS system and the 40 inch LCD TV. Neither of those were items I wanted (or could have afforded) so it was rather easy to take a pass. I get the feeling the GPS was something the manufacturer really just wanted to unload and get rid of because this Best Buy store had 150 of them.

4 AM rolls around and they've got the cops out there to monitor things and they start tightening up the line to prevent folks from cutting in front. As I would learn, there were folks who were lined up since noon on Thanksgiving. Man, I didn't realize a laptop or TV could be that important to some, but whatever. I'm sure someone reading this will give me shit because I was out at 2 AM, but realistically I knew that the store would be a real clusterfuck if I was farther back in line. I was willing to take the risk.

Finally it's 5 AM and we're in the store by 5:10 or so. I get to video games, the DS's are gone already. So we head out of the store and over to the Target, thinking it had just opened. Nope, Target was opening at 6. Joshua really wasn't looking for anything this Black Friday, he just liked to people watch. However, yesterday he had mentioned he was looking for a Christmas tree and I saw a 7.5 ft pre-lit Christmas tree for $48, which is basically a steal. So we stand in line, there's maybe 40 people in front of us. The Target associates hand us bags with some foodstuffs inside as well as a sort of "survival kit".

The store opens and I get my ass in there and over to Electronics. I ask an associate where to find the DS's, and he tells me to stick by him as they're on their way out right now. So the associate with the cart full of the video game systems comes out and I'm instructed to follow him, he goes to the counter, and then the guy tells me to get in line. It pissed me off a bit because I was told to follow this guy, not get into a line elsewhere, but I just make a remark about getting some bad instructions and head into the line. I get to at least the back part of the counter, and perhaps it was because I had been nice, or the guy realized how I had been misinformed, but he hands the DS to one of the cashiers and calls me up to the front. So in the end, I got my hot little hands on the Nintendo DS that I wanted, plus a $10 gift card to Target since that was part of the promotion. It will be put towards buying screen protectors.

Joshua and I headed to the Christmas section and found the tree in the ad, along with a few odds and ends he needed for himself, and then we got out of Target. Our next stop was over to Michael's since Joshua wanted to pick up a frame for his certificate for completing the number of course hours needed to become an Electrician. Michael's had a coupon for 25% off of your entire purchase if you came in between 6 and 9 AM on Friday, so he found what he was looking for, along with a gingerbread house kit. I dropped him off at home and it was time for me to head to work.

Along the way I saw Macy's so of course I stopped in to see if there was anything to take advantage of. I picked up some 180's headphones that were on sale for $15 and a nice polo shirt that was regularly $55, but on sale for $10. I also tried some Calvin Klein Euphoria cologne that I had sampled in my latest Maxim, but I didn't get it. Actually it's not a bad scent after a few minutes, but when it was first sprayed on, the alcohol smell was a bit overwhelming. I may go and try it again at another store just to see if maybe it was a bad tester bottle.

Got to work and got a lot of work done. I know I was dragging a bit because I was tired, but I still got everything done, plus I got what I wanted. So Thanksgiving and Black Friday were both good days.