Black Friday and Beyond

So, back in time to over a week ago...

Black Friday has been a tradition for Jenny and I ever since we got married. We started the first day after Thanksgiving that we were married. We decided on a whim to go to Best Buy and get a door buster deal on an Aladdin DVD. We went to the Best Buy on Riverdale Road and ended up towards the end of the line about 1/2 mile away (maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but not much)in front of the Lowe's. People were amazed that we would get up that early for a $15 DVD. I was amazed that that many people would sacrifice sleep after a holiday to wait in the cold for these deals. We were in and out of the store in about 10 minutes with our DVD and a couple of other things. We decided that since it was so early, we would go to Kohls to see what was going on there. We ended up buying the rest of our Christmas and had all our shopping done within an hour. It took us two hours to pay, though. We decided two things on that day: 1) We were going to do this every year, and 2) we needed to recruit some people to tag team with.

Since then, our experience had evolved in sophistication. We recruited my brother Adam and his wife Jami the next year. We split time in line so our whole experience was only about 2 hours. We were careful to choose a few items from the Thanksgiving day ads and mapped out a path for the next morning. The last two years we've been accompanied by my sister and her husband and my other brother. We've seen some pretty crazy things and we always make sure to have fun or it could be a pretty miserable experience.

This year was somewhat different in that we didn't have any specific items we were shopping for, but there was no way that was going to stop us. We did start a little later than usual and made Target our one major stop. We got there shortly before the doors opened at 6:00. The line was already down the entire front of the store and around the corner to the back side. We ended up back there and counted down the minutes before the doors opened. My Jami, Sarah and Matt decided to hang out towards the front of the line to witness the inevitable commotion. There were a few skirmishes as people outside the lines tried to push there way in. I will say, to Target's credit, they had things pretty well under control this year. By the time we were getting into the store, the real die-hards were already making their way out with their doorbuster big-ticket items. We made sure to let the guys who sacrificed
sleep and the possibility of frost bite for a $575 flat screen TV that we respected their efforts.

We make it a priority to get the cheap DVDs. They had a great selection and we stocked up. We got a few toy items for the kids, some great deals, and just took in the sights and sounds of a Target packed with enough humanity and shopping carts to fill, well, a SuperTarget. One piece of advice...don't bother with a cart unless you have someone who can stay with the cart outside of the main congestion. Have runners to make specific grabs in high-concentration areas, specifically the toy section. Another tip: bring all of your patience with you. I can't believe how many grumpy people show up at these early morning sales, cursing and complaining about the crowded ailes and lack of personal help. What did you expect coming into this? A little common sense, please.

At any rate, after Target, we split up a bit and headed off to other destinations. There is an Old Navy and a Toys R Us within walking distance of Target so we made a trip over there and got some good, unexpected deals. We waited in line for a little while at Toys R Us, but overall it was a good experience for our first time in that store on Black Friday.

We wrapped up our morning at a little after 8:00. I think it's worth the time and effort to get all of our shopping done in about 2 hours. You also can't beat the deals you can find, even when you're not planning on finding any.

After that, we enjoyed the rest of the long weekend with family and friends. It never seems to last long enough and then you're back at work. It's busier than usual because you're playing catch up for the short week the week before. It also seemed like everyone was sick with something. I had one day where there was one MA in my clinic with 3 doctors because everyone else was late or sick. Must have been sleeping off the tryptophan. It's weird to think that Christmas is only 24 days away.