I know there are some people who would never venture out into the craziness of Black Friday.
For us, it's a tradition. Ordinarily we get up early, hit a couple of early places, get breakfast, hit a couple more places and get back home around noon.
Just as it's tradition to go buy two Tampa Tribune papers, one for me, one for Christina. Which, was a bigger pain this year than it should have been. I got up at 5 and drove the 1.5 miles to the nearest convienence store only to be told that the paper lady had not yet arrived and to come back at 6. The St Pete Times was there (at 3:30 they told me!) but the Trib lady was never that early. Went back at 6 - still no paper lady. Went back at 7 -- this time prepared to wait it out with a notepad to make some thinking notes and a book to read. Finally at 7:50 she pulled in. I could have slept in till 7:30 and still had the first newspaper!! Keep in mind I live in the middle of nowhere. Newspapers are not home delivered. You either have to know where there is a coin box or buy from a convienence store. I'm 100 miles to St. Pete and 50 to Tampa. Makes no sense to me that the closer paper was 3 hours later!
Prior to the shopping there is the tradition called the 'Reading of the Ads'. This is where we spread out the ads on the table, browse, discuss, circle, list, prioritize. Even Madelynne got into the ads this year. Too bad my camera is not where I am right now but it's not, so I'll have to post that picture later.
Like I said, usually we get up early and go. This year, 'getting up early' would have been too late.
Walmart's sale started at midnight, Toys R Us was open all night long, some stores opened at 3, others at 4.
So what does Hard Core Black Friday Shoppers do? You pull an all nighter that's what.
We left Christina's, ads in hand at 9:45 p.m. All the kids were in bed and we left Austin watching television. We had decided to go to Lakeland. (Our choices were Clermont, Brooksville, Leesburg, The Villages, Ocala, Wesley Chapel or Lakeland.) Walmart was advertising 'come shop while you wait' and that sounded good to us so off to Walmart we go, getting there about 10:15.
The parking lot was already packed and we quickly found out that the 'shop while you wait' was not possible. The store was ringed with pallets of the sales items. If you wanted one of those items, you staked out a claim near the pallet and stayed there. You could not get up and down some aisles as they had them taped off with 'Do Not Enter' signs. Christina wanted a pallet item, so she staked out her space and I wandered over to Crafts and picked up two $20 Cricut Cartridges, went and bought us Mountain Dews (Caffiene - Good!) and went back to keep Christy company. About 11:30 an employee came and unwrapped that pallet and boxes started to go into carts. Including ours. One lady had planned ahead and picked up two bath towels and covered her box and one by one the boxes and the people disappeared into the store. We waited a bit ... then did the same. We looked for the $4 pajama's. Couldn't find them and made our way to the front of the store and got in line at the checkout. Of course, you couldn't check out until 12:01. At midnight, straight up, a loud roar came from the side of the store. We could hear people shouting and screaming and then saw people running. We looked at each other wondering what was going on but it was just Walmarts planned and enforced riot as people were grabbing merchandise.
What a stupid system. Instead of letting people 'shop while they wait' -- as in, pick up the stuff you were interested in buying and wander the store getting other things, they created an unsafe atmosphere by making people wait until midnight to then fight over what was on the pallets. And of course, nothing rang up correctly. I felt sorry for the store clerks!
We left Walmart and got over to Toys R Us. There was a line outside just to get in. They were letting 15 people out and then 15 more could go in. We heard about a huge line just to check out so I gave Christina my list of things and we decided I would go and immediately get in the checkout lane while she shopped. I do not know what the problem was with the cashier system there, but the checkout line was over 2 hours long, weaving in and out of the aisles, (which made the aisles impassible). They were out of the sale items we were interested in and since everything in our cart was regularly priced items, we decided to abandon that store and move on.
Next was Old Navy. We stood in line for about 10 minutes to get inside. We saw some cute kids clothes but this was Christy's store and not mine so I went outside and sat down. Besides, I don't like those creepy looking manequins! Same thing there, what was on sale was gone and what she liked was regular priced and not worth the wait in line so we moved on to Children's Place and Arispostle just because they were open. So far, not so much buying being done. In and out of 4 stores in a row without spending a penny.
We drove through the plaza with Target and followed the line of people waiting to get in and decided we were not going to wait in line and went to breakfast at IHOP instead for an energy booster and a bathroom break. By now it's 3 a.m. or shortly after.
Back to Target we go right in and split up. I go get the one big box item I want, guilt trip the attendent at the 'trying-on-room' to give me her cart that had one package of batteries in it, meet up with Christina, do a little more shopping and get in line. Where we stood. For 2 hours. And the big box became invisible to Christina. At one point I said I was done shopping for the person who the big box was for. She said, "Really? What did you get that person?" The big-box was, literally, 6 inches from her face. Later, someone in line asked her 'who is the big-box-item for'. Now she's looking around to see who's basket that item is in ... hello! It's in ours! Right in front of you!! Ok, maybe you had to be there. Maybe she was a little punchy considering we had been up all night, but it was funny to me. And maybe it was funny to me since I had been up since 5am Thursday to buy newspapers!
One thing I found though -- people talk to Christina. In every line, in every store, people talk to Christina like she is their long lost friend. And they talk about everything: their Thanksgiving, what they are shopping for, who they are shopping for, compare ads, discuss ads etc.
After Target we went back to the mall and shopped at Bath & Body Works and Sears. Sears always puts their pretty little girl dresses on sale for 60% off and since we have 2 pretty little girls, it's a good match.
By now it's coming up on 9 a.m. and we discuss whether we really need to go to Michaels or Joanns. Which, we decided we did not, even though I hated to let those good coupons go to waste. I could have found something, even though it would have been for me and not a Christmas present, but even all nighters must end sometime.
Christina started to doze off as we were coming back across the Green Swamp and I said, no, don't do that, stay awake and talk to me. She tried to convince me she was listening with her eyes closed. Ummm .... not! We got back to her house almost exactly 12 hours after we left. The kids were eating breakfast and I had a bowl of cereal with them and passed out ... I mean went to sleep ... in Brendyn's bed. Who, by the way, was promised a rich reward for monitoring a kid movie and sippy cups while we passed out. I mean slept. Christina came and woke me up at 2pm. It wasn't a long enough sleep, but her theory was that if we slept too long, we wouldn't sleep that night.
At 5ish, I packed up the three oldest kids and off we went to Clermont to see Tangled. We missed the first 8 minutes so if someone could tell me HOW the Wicked Witch Who Wanted To Stay Young and Beautiful Forever took the Princess, we'd be most appreciative of the information. Great movie by the way. Two thumbs up from the boys and Madelynne!
Christmas shopping is done except for something for Wyatt. Just havn't found the right thing for him yet. Waiting for one more shipment to come in from online shopping and bought wrapping paper and tape. I'll start wrapping in the evenings, a few things at a time.
Count this Black Friday as successful.
And it's good to know, that when I need to, I can still pull that All Nighter and survive!
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