So it's Thanksgiving night and I am safely at home having conquered the "people of Walmart". It started with the traditional paper scan that has become a sacred ritual after the big Thanksgiving lunch. My Aunt Sandra and Aunt Becky are legendary shoppers on Black Friday. Each year, Sandra arrives with the papers, one for each of us and my cousins Jo and Heidi (they are not shoppers in store, they are shoppers in papers).
Jo's son, Kyle, made the mistake of trying to touch my Walmart paper, before I had even looked at it. Clearly the child had a death wish. Apparently he was unaware of the sacred paper and how it must not be touched or moved without permission. A hush fell over the room as I snarled, nostrils flared, and warned him it could not be touched until I had seen it first. I reminded him this was MY paper and if he wanted to look at something before me, he needed to scoot on over to his mother and check out her paper. Paper protocol established, we all began perusing our own individual papers and trying to decide who had been good enough to earn a valued 'Black Friday Deal'.
Walmart had deals on a TV for Matt, two games for Andrew, and some Rubbermaid storage containers I wanted. I knew Walmart was going to be risky, especially since they were starting the deals at 8 p.m., with the electronics going on sale at 10 p.m. I got to the store around 8:15 p.m. I had to drive around the entire store, not just the parking lot, the entire store, to find a parking spot. That took about 20 minutes. Once I finally parked, legally, I made my way inside. I entered on the food side only to find it full of customers. I thought to myself, is there a deal on milk or something? No, this was where the lines for the TVs and laptops started. Those things that aren't even on sale until 10 p.m. The line was literally wrapped all the way through each of the 10 food aisles. I decided then, Matt would not be getting the TV.
So, I headed for the games section. Sadly, the only games left were not the ones I wanted. If I had wanted a game from 1997 there was plenty of stock on those. Oddly enough, the Rubbermaid storage containers I wanted were stocked aplenty, so I got what I wanted, headed to the checkout and left Walmart having only spent $22. A rare occasion indeed.
As I headed to my car, I realized I was being stalked by several future customers. It's kind of eerie to be walking and having a car follow you at the same speed as you step. Just for fun, I decided to cut in and out of lanes to confuse folks. I thought about dropping off my packages and heading back into the store, just to see the disappointed driver who thought I would be leaving. But realizing that would really just be too mean, I threw my stuff in the back of the car and gave a knowing nod to the lucky stalker who had stopped when they realized I had reached my car and was leaving.
So now I have to decide if I want to stay up until midnight and head to Belk or if I should just order everything online and let UPS do the driving and parking. Sometimes, the fees for shipping are worth it.
