black friday — This Mom's Wired

Black Friday Is Where You Pretend To Start Christmas Shopping

November 27, 2010 by sarah 1 Comment

(And instead go buy stuff for yourself)

I do Black Friday.

I did Black Friday.

And I somehow survived Black Friday despite a sinus infection and a course of antibiotics that has left me queasy and with the taste of pennies in my mouth (don’t ask me if it’s working yet, because so far I am keeping the folks at Kleenex in business and have been on a mad hunt for cherry Lifesavers since my doc said that it would help the penny taste).

After a day spent with family on Thanksgiving (primarily curled up on the couch, trying to not be that one family member that falls asleep – I know my family – that person’s picture always ends up pictured on Facebook – drooling on their pillow), I was not quite geared up to wake up at the gruesome six o’clock hour. To shop.

(I didn’t wake up. I overslept. Got ready in five minutes. Like a boss.)

Hit Starbucks for a venti with an extra shot and was good to go.

Sort of.

Okay. I was along for the ride.

See, the thing is… I never really need anything when I go shopping for Black Friday. There is almost never anything I need quite so badly that I’m going to be upset if I’ve missed the deal. Frankly, I’ve been doing Christmas shopping for over a month, so I was kind of winging it.

Shopping with my mother is an interesting experience anyway – and toss feeling like road kill into the mix, and it was a morning of slow-going. At one point, I wandered into the shoe section of a department store just so I could sit down and stare blankly for five minutes amidst hordes of people trying to get a deal on ugly footwear.

I promise I wasn’t a scrooge all day.

I really wasn’t.

Especially once I wandered into Old Navy and found something I wanted for myself. And then bought four of them. What? That’s half the fun of Black Friday, right? STIMULATING THE ECONOMY, one five dollar camisole at a time. It was Old Navy that I ran into my sister-in-law. She and her mother had been shopping since FOUR IN THE MORNING. I’m just not quite that dedicated.

I did end up picking up some gifts for the kids – easy because there seems to be nothing they don’t want (Pumpkin asked for an iPad – but if mama doesn’t have one, the kids sure won’t).

Today? I’m so exhausted and confused about what day of the week it is and thinking of things that I might have bought yesterday but didn’t (uh, hello slippers to replace the ones the dog ate). I’m on a mission to be done Christmas shopping by mid-month – I didn’t put too much of a dent in to the process yesterday, so, we’ll see.

Black Friday Fill Ins

So, I wasn’t busting any doors at 5 a.m. today but my mom and I ventured out at 6:30 to the mall and to see what there was to see. There was nothing I needed, but for some sick reason, I like Black Friday. I like to go out and see people all crazed and excited over the holidays and I like an excuse to get a huge chunk of my Christmas shopping done.

My mom started in a department store and I quickly ventured out so that I could hit Starbucks for a (full of sugar) gingerbread latte. That line was INSANE. Then I ventured into Children’s Place to pick up some clothes for the girls – because on top of crazy good sales, there was 20% off everything in the store until 11 a.m. Awesome. But that line? That was one horrendous line. It snaked all through the store and was about forty minutes long. The fun part though was that the people around me in line were AWESOME. In front of me were two women who shopped as they waited – and we ended up talking and shopping and I would give my opinion (I can’t believe there are people who ask random strangers what they think about clothes, but not only did they ask, they listened to me. Shows how crazy nuts they are). The older man behind me (holding his wife’s spot while she shopped – so sweet, right?) offered to hold my coffee when my cell phone rang, and later, his wife helped me grab a shirt off the shelf when my hands were full. Though there were people squashed in everywhere, I didn’t stumble into any cranky ones. A huge plus.

In the midst of my waiting, my mom dropped off a heavy bag that had a gift she had purchased for my stepson. A heavy, cumbersome bag. I dragged it through Children’s Place, and by the time I was done and had carried that freakin’ bag to Kohl’s (her next stop), I thought my shoulder might fall off.

Kohl’s was pure insanity so I ditched mom (unfortunately, I was still stuck with her stupid bag) and went to Old Navy to pick up some clothes for Stepson. And yeah, if you saw a woman in the boy’s section of Old Navy this morning trying on boy’s clothes – that was probably me. Unsure of his size, I ended up trying on a vest to see if it would fit him. I ended up buying him a boat load of clothes – a necessity since he had a major growth spurt and his mom never lets him bring clothes with him to our house. In the check out at Old Navy, I was standing behind a girl I went to high school with. A girl I didn’t like then, a girl I have nothing to say to now (especially after she went on to become a high school math teacher, gave my sister a crappy grade all the while asking what I was up to as if we’d ever been friends). I managed to avoid her though – whew. Crisis averted (YES – I should move).

From there, I met back up with my mom and we ventured to Best Buy where basically everything purchased was for me for Christmas (Oh yeah, there will apparently be no surprises), then on to Target where mom went crazy and bought far too much stuff for my kids.

Pure insanity, but not in a bad way.

***

1. My stomach is not accustomed to Thanksgiving amounts of food.

2. Mashed potatoes is what I ate the most of on Thursday.

3. The yard is barely green anymore.

4. Away is where I’d rather be at any given time.

5. The smell of gingerbread reminds me of the holidays.

6. Sleep is what I need right now.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to curling up with a book, tomorrow my plans include not eating like a pig, and Sunday I want to get the Christmas tree up (Did I say that?).

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