Happy Black Friday Ya’ll!  I know I didn’t post a great Thanksgiving post but to admit to it…well we’re traveling a lot this month!  So ya’ll have to settle for a previous post where I present the three C’s of Black Friday.  I wrote this in December of 2009 and I think it still applies to today.  This Black Friday is the first in a long time that I’ve actually been able to go Black Friday shopping with other women.  Namely my sister and mom who are Black Friday Experts.  I’m looking forward to the visiting and the shopping!

While visiting family, I convinced my in-laws and Mark that it would be a great idea if they watched our kids while Mark and I got up early and went shopping.  By early, I mean 4:00 a.m.  However, Ceili Rain thought it would be fun to get us up at 2:30.  Now, in our time where we actually live it was more like 3:30 so we gained an hour, right?  Whatever, it was early and cold and Mark and I didn’t have coats…but we trudged out anyway (in borrowed coats).  We hit McDonald’s then to Sears and then to KMart.  We sat in the K-Mart parking lot for about 30 minutes waiting on the store to open and watching the people in line freeze.  Then we watched them walk in and got in the line when it started moving.  We’re lazy like that.  Because we waited I couldn’t get one of the things on my list but that’s not a big deal.

While we were waiting we developed the Three C’s of Black Friday.

1.  Comraderie:  This is where you meet new people (usually in the checkout line or trying to find a product marked on the advertisement).  You smile and are warm and friendly to people you probably never would have talked to on any other given day.  In Mark’s case it’s where he got “the nod” from several other husbands who had been woken up too early and did not have enough coffee (and I think Mark believes there is no such thing for that early in the morning) to get them fully enthralled with the Black Friday event.  This is also where one person admires another person’s Christmas sweater and discusses the fine art of Santa placement to jingle bells(that may run into the last C).  Or, since it was Alabama vs. Auburn day, where you say, “Roll Tide” to every Bama fan that passes.
2.  Competition:  You’re at the end of the bicycle aisle and there’s only one $10 bike left.  You look at it and then straight ahead and see another customer eyeing the same bike.  And this is where the competition begins.  There are no rules in the Competition part of Black Friday.  No blood, no foul or if you can get out of there before store security finds you.  To get what you want you can bump carts, push, shove, scream, punch, or fake an illness to distract so your partner can grab.  All bets are off if you have to enter this “C” of Black Friday.
3.  Crazy:  Now seriously, you knew this was coming.  One day out of the whole years where you get up (or just don’t go to sleep) to get the “absolute best deals of the season.”  People have to be a little crazy to do this.  You’ve got your “elf” crazy people who are dressed in red and green from head (including the elf hat or reindeer antlers and flashing nose) to toe (elf shoes).  Then there are those who, like we heard about on the radio, just didn’t go to sleep Thanksgiving night and went to a late movie and then out shopping.  It can also include my “crazy” cousins who had Taco Bell and pizza for breakfast (because that was what was open in the food court…sorry for using you guys but it works for this category).  Or you can be as crazy as us, who, since our child wouldn’t sleep, woke up the in-laws to take care of them while we rushed out into the bitter cold to buy a drill and a couple of presents (and seriously, I got some tennis shoes and some shirts but we really only bought a couple of presents).  And the lines to check out…insanely crazy.

I know this post is two weeks past Black Friday but, if you remember, how’d you make out?  We did get some good deals on a few gifts and some things I needed (maternity shirts half off…Alabama shirts that are now starting to be too small for me but I’m determined to wear one in January…oh yeah).  Mark also told me we could have added more C’s and other letters but I kept it short and simple.  Don’t want to bore you or anything.