Black Friday - whatcha doin'? whereya goin'?

Wow I didnt know the bra's are 50% off. I might just head there!

I'll be asleep. Although I could use a new jump drive.

I'll be at my sister's making mulitple trips between the couch and the kitchen. that is all.

sadly I will be working Thursday and Friday (some one gotta ring up the customers)

I hate black Friday !!! Unfortunately my sister's drag me out to a shopping center in Montgomery :grumble:

I'm going to be at home watching back episodes of Scandal on Netflix.

YES!!! Lol

Nowhere and nothing. All y'all shopping fanatics kind of freak me out.

I typically avoid Black Friday like the plague, but I am in desparate need of a new TV. I'm going to be limited in where I can go since I have to leave for work by 7am, so I'll be scouring the ads to find my best option. Would consider going out on Thanksgiving if the deal is right, never done that before either. Cyber Monday never seems to have deals as good as Black Friday on TV's (that I've seen anyway).

Wow I didnt know the bra's are 50% off. I might just head there!

<insert joke here>

if you come over to my place, it'd be 100% off

I have to work. And I don't work retail, either. I am planning on doing Small Business Saturday, though.

i didn't see what i asked was in the OP

Going to gym, other than that...staying home w/ the kiddos.

cyber Monday is way better...I don't have to get up early and stand in line with a bunch of dumb *kitten* who trample each other to save a couple bucks on some bull**** they probably don't even need...but it's 40% off yo; gots to have it...



^^^this is asinine...plus I don't like people touching me, so some mother f'ers would get hurt for sure.

Short version: I dunno yet; haven't checked the ads yet. But I am NOT shopping on T-day; that's family time.

Background:
I USED to be a Black Friday addict! The adrenaline rush, staying awake 24+ hours and hitting a dozen stores, midnight madness, etc. However, last year was the first year since 1995 where I didn't automatically have both Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday off. I was only a few months into the job, so I didn't want to burn any leave unless sick. I did hit WalMart's T-Day night sale and got 2 excellent TV deals, cheap BluRays, and other stuff. But I worked on Black Friday.

I essentially became a "Cyber Monday and afterwards..." shopper. I think it might have stuck. I haven't even checked out the Black Friday ads yet this year and I used to spend days mapping out sales and strategies. I'm talking spreadsheets, GPS maps, etc.

Three other things might also turned me off from (most of) the Black Friday madness.
(1) They keep pushing the sales backwards in time; T-Day night was one thing, but now you have stores starting T-day morning! At this rate of one-ups-manship, in a few years the midnight sales will start a week earlier! #SMDH
(2) Cyber Monday has become so popular, Black Friday deals aren't as spectacular in comparison as they once were. Except for the 2 TVs I bought, pretty much everything I would've wanted on Black Friday was available for similar prices the following week.
(3) There used to be a bit of 'forbidden fruit' aspect to getting Black Friday ads early. Seeing the stores sending "cease and desist" letters to websites,etc., kinda made you feel like you had an angle that others didn't. A lie, yes, but you could live that lie. Nowadays, the stores proactively send their ads to this sites weeks in advance. There's no more 'taboo' left to it.

Having been an avid, regular Black Friday shopper for close to 2 decades, I will say this. First, the majority of my buys were actually worth the time/effort. Second, the stores have VASTLY improved their strategies! 2011/2012 was WAAAYYY nicer than even 2008! Take Walmart for example. In 2010, they ran outta shopping carts because people (including me) snatched them all up hours before the sales started. It was a mystery where everything was, so most of the carts were jammed up around the electronic dept. When the sales actually started, you had to abandon your basket cuz of the glut of traffic in one area. I and others were walking around carrying stacks of boxes for hours until it cleared up some. Nowadays, they provide maps on the website and app, they spread stuff out all across the store and mark it off with balloons so you can see from afar. And in a genius move, the most popular deals are in the grocery section where they can cordone off aisles and wrap lines in a neat serpentine fashion. Last year, I got EVERYTHING that I wanted with time to spare.

The day after Thanksgiving in our little family is officially known as "Christmas Tree Day" so the only thing we'll be shopping for is a Christmas Tree. We found a new farm last year that has amazing trees so we'll be going there since our old farm (the one we've been going to for almost 15 years! is closed this year.) We schlep all over the place trying to find that elusive "perfect tree" until we're all exhausted. Did I mention that we usually have a HUGE, "Griswold Family Christmas" sized tree? Then we get to drag that sucker back to the car and of course we usually find one in the farthest corner of the place! It usually overhangs our Suburban when we tie it up there.

Plenty of exercise for the day after Thanksgiving! Which is good because we usually start the day off with a little left over turkey and a piece of pie and end it with our official "Christmas Tree Day Molasses Cookies" that our kids make. We eat these while drinking cocoa and watching "A Christmas Story" after having decorated the tree. By that time we're all too exhausted to move so if anyone is hungry they get to pick meat off the turkey carcass and eat more pie. My kids told me a couple of years ago that it's their favorite day of the entire year.