BLACK FRIDAY!

Well, hope you had a great Thanksgiving holiday! Mine was great. Went out to the farm to my roomies mom's place. We had great food. You know the usual turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, cranberries, and the worlds best mashed potatoes!...haha..I only say that as it was my virgin run making mashed potatoes. They were pretty good of course so was the rest of the meal. Kris was in charge of carving up turkey or should I say giving it some sort of after death torture, poor old bird. Just kidding you did a great job Skip!

After the meal we sat around and chatted which is always fun. I of course had get in my few plays on words and jokes so it was a good day....then came black Friday!

I decided to do the black Friday thing since I have never in my life done this. For some odd reason I woke up at 4:30am Friday morning and was drawn to the ads on the counter in the kitchen. I went through the paces of making notes as the where I was going and what I was looking for and the times the stores opened. I thought I had a great game plan and would out smart the regular Black Friday Shoppers! I pull out of the driveway at 5:30am and start on my adventure. I hit the first store...Office Max. They had a Zune player there that was pretty cheap and so I thought it would be good to download pictures to. I was the 12th person in line. I am feeling GREAT. It is a bit cold but I am excited until this lady walks up and asked, "what time does this store open?" Of course I am ready to say 6:00am but the lady in front of me says "7:00am!" I had to double check my notes. Rookie mistake....I was to be at STAPLES not OFFICE MAX! So I get in the trusty Sidekick and head out to Staples. By this time it is 5:45am and the line at Staples is LONG! I have no idea what number I was in line but it was an amazing event to say the least. I am hanging there all bundled up when I hear people behind me talking about what they have encountered from previous years. This one lady said she was after a foosball table last year at Walmart. They get in the store and she makes a dash for the foosball table while her friend gets the cart to haul it out. I guess in all the frenzy there was only one table left so this lady sat on the table waiting for her friend to bring the cart! She even told one lady that she could have the table if she could get her off of it! I could not believe it! Ok, so we are still standing in line waiting for them to open the store. Then some people tried to cut in line and the WHOLE CROWD yelled at them! I WAS AMAZED! Then the ladies behind me plotted out their strategy. The one said "Ok, now you are going to the checkout counter while I go and get the item right?" Can you believe it? These chicks were seasoned professionally Black Friday Girls. Well, long story short, I was after the 4GB memory card and by the time I got in the store people were pushing and shoving and the cards were gone. No big deal. I decided to head back to Office Max before Staples emptied out. I hit the parking lot and look to be around the 70th in line. Not what I had hoped but it was ok. I ended up talking to some nice people in line. They were after the same thing I was which was not good. The had said they were at Toys R Us earlier that morning when it opened and it was a mess. I guess the police were called for some unruly man that took all the call tag slips for the Zune and walked out the door thinking he would come back and pay later. He would pay alright! The Office Max line was a bit different and I quickly learned new tactics. I found out that sometimes it is best to scope out the inventory through the windows to see exactly if you can spot what you are going to purchase there. I did this a few times. Then to my surprise they opened the doors. Everyone was so EXCITED then I heard them yell out something and people raising their arms in the air so our group did the same. I have no idea what it was for but we were jumping to get attention. It didn't happen. I figured out that they brought out some call tags and the people in the front of the line got pretty much what they wanted by the time they got back to us the Zunes were gone........DANG IT! The guy behind me said that Walmart had them also for about the same price so off I went...AGAIN...they were sold out. OH WELL. I have to say that it was an adventure. I have never seen anything like it before in my life. Glad there wasn't any REAL violence and I did get a DVD player for the basement at the Clubhouse for $30 so that was good...WOW! I have to have a better game plan for next year...LOOK OUT BLACK FRIDAY SHOPPERS, I AM CREATING A BATTLE PLAN FOR NEXT YEAR!

Hit the Parade of Lights...OOPS...AVERA Parade of Lights on Friday night. It was a great time as always!

FUN HOLIDAY.........