Happy Black Friday...

[Blonde leading the blonde]

..to everyone who didn't get trampled to death by a thousand or so of their customers, or shot in a toy store.

Seriously -- who the fuck brings a gun to a Toys-R-Us? Who does that? I mean, really, what kind of an addle-pated moron wakes up in the morning, takes a dump, gets dressed and before leaving the house thinks, "Whoa! Gotta remember to take my gun with me" then heads off to a gargantuan fucking toy store? OK, and two of them? Forget the OK Corral, I'm heading to the toy store -- let's just see what kind of a man Bobby's Daddy *really* is when he's staring down the barrel of a gun! That'll show him!

And the trampling -- at Wal-Mart? Best Buy I'd almost understand, but Wal-Mart? Sure it's cheap, but it's cheap.

OK, new proclamation: As Supreme Empress of the Universe, I hereby declare it to be wantonly moronic to give up Thanksgiving dinner with your friends, family, dog, or favorite porn movie in favor of spending the night pretending to be homeless. In an effort to work some chlorine into the gene pool, wantonly moronic acts are hereby considered capital crimes, and the guilty parties shall be executed by Michael Vick and then entered into the Darwin Award Contest.

Merry Thanksgivoween.

Oh, yeah, and here.

[Blake NWR]

http://blog.myspace.com/royale76

My lil' rant on the subject.

[Blonde leading the blonde]

Yeah, I get that. You know, though, Black Friday can be a beautiful thing. The key is to not get yourself into a frenzy over crap you don't need and can't afford. I hit those sales every year, and I've never once been trampled or shot. Of course, I don't go to Toys-R-Us and I've only been to Best Buy twice. When I was raising Matt on a very limited budget, it was our salvation. What I couldn't get at Value Village, I could afford on Black Friday. Screw the "Back to School" sales. I know the pattern of the ads on Black Friday, and if someone doesn't match those prices, I wait. As a bonus, I'd wrap EVERYTHING and put it under the tree, so he always had lots to open along with his video game or whatever the one special gift was. During the Depression, Grandma got my Mom and Aunts socks for Christmas, and wrap them all separately, making it a game to guess which package the other sock was in -- same principle and it's what gave me the idea.

This year, I'm still working in homebuilding. After the layoffs, I'm still employed but the charity that our company has "adopted" has more kids in it and there are fewer of us buying. To that end, I got my tags early and hit the Black Friday sales. I got 4 kids for the price of two, basically, and Dave got a couple, too. It helps, because there are employees who've had hours and salaries cut who won't have anything to give, and it's all made possible by Black Friday, just not at Best Buy or Toys-R-Us.

But, yeah -- common decency and all.