Commit me now!

Well, I did it again. The thing I swore never to do again. That's right - I went shopping on Black Friday. It's official - I'm certifiably insane and should now be sent posthaste to a mental institution. It's all Mom's fault. I was quite happily ignoring the ads, secure in the knowledge that I would be sleeping in, tucked snugly in my nice, warm, comfortable bed, my husband snoring gently by my side, when she pointed out that Circuit City had a laptop for $299.00. I knew what that meant - it was the death-knell tolling for my plans to hide out under the covers away from all the crazy people that thrive on that kind of stuff. So, we got up - I picked her up at 4:50 so we could get to Circuit City by the ungodly hour of 5:00am. When we arrived, it wasn't quite 5 yet, and the parking lot was packed. Seriously packed. Cars as far as the eye could see. And the line! I don't think Ellis Island ever had such a teeming mass of humanity, waiting to enter the land of milk and honey (and electronics), hoping for that magical moment when the gates would open and they could rush forth into a shopper's paradise, abounding with deals galore. Needless to say, we did not wait in line. Instead, we found a parking spot and sat for a minute, then joined the throng as the end of the line passed our position. Amazingly enough, we also ran into my friend Scott, which, if it hadn't been 5:00 in the morning, would have made the trip worthwhile. When we finally got into the store, we made a beeline for the computer area, where we milled about with other hopeful shoppers, until a lady informed us that they had given out vouchers in line earlier, and if you didn't have a voucher, you weren't getting a laptop. Seeing that we didn't have a voucher, yep, that's right - we got up at the butt-crack of dawn for no earthly reason. I made a feeble attempt to get over to the DVDs that had been advertised, hoping to snag a James Bond set, but I couldn't even push my way through to the containers they were in, and gave it up as a bad job. Besides, from the state of the lines, we weren't getting to a cash register any time soon, anyway. So, we left and headed to the next stop on the list.

Since JoAnn's is in the same plaza, and they had beads for 40% off, plus a coupon for 20% off our entire purchase, I thought we should check it out. The problem was that they didn't open until 6:00, and it was now 5:15. We decided to stay the course, and waited in the car for the remainder of the time, while we watched a line form there, too. By this time, I was seriously wondering what everyone was in line for, since I couldn't see anything, other than a 7.5 foot tree for 29.99, that should be garnering that amount of interest. Finally, the clock struck 6, and we raced back to the bead area. We were pretty much the only ones back there, so there wasn't the pushing, shoving, and general chaos that there was at Circuit City. We waited in a relatively manageable line, and made it out of there by 6:30. Since Mom wanted to pick up some milk at Walgreen's, we decided to make that our last stop. By the time we got there, it was about 6:45, and we found out that they didn't open until 7:00. Of course, there was the ubiquitous line. I never knew that even Walgreen's would have a line. Unbelieveable.

I hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving, and isn't too stuffed with good food to move. If you're one of the people who actually likes the whole Black Friday thing, I commend you. I'm getting too old for this stuff...