Black Friday- Will YOU Be Out There?

Well, I guess we're the only people around here who think it's fun!

I'd like to hit the stores that day, although I wouldn't buy that much; I just like the decorations and all the craziness. However, mr cypher is a dreadful stick-in-the-mud and nothing I could say would persuade him to venture out that day. I guess I'll be staying home and digging the Christmas deco out of the shed, making cocoa, and watching my holiday cartoon specials on DVD instead. (unless Bethie will come pick me up! )

You guys have fun!

I won't be anywhere near the mall. I love shopping, but I hate crowds.

We will be at home, enjoying leftovers and beginning the Christmas decorating. That's our family tradition for the day after Thanksgiving. If it's nice, we'll be outdoors, hanging garlands and big red velvet bows off the balcony. If not, we'll be inside putting up the tree.

I'm going to start addressing my holiday cards. I love keeping in touch, but addressing the envelopes is pure drudge work and the sooner I have that chore over and done with the more festive I feel.

I'm going to the mall. Not to go shopping, but to drive around, and pretend to steal people's parking spots in order to start fights.

Actually, I just found out great news: circuit city is doing their sale both in-store and ONLINE.

I bought a digital picture frame at Target last week for $130, and it's on sale tomorrow for about 1/2. I'm going to try circuit city online for one tomorrow and return the other one. If they don't have one, maybe I'll hit up Best Buy late morning to try to grab one or two.

No - I am not shopping. I usually work that day. The best day of the year to work. No traffic, we close early, hardly anyone in the office so few interruptions, etc.

I have in the past though, on my way into work, pop into a store or two (this was when I worked in downtown Boston). Could pick up a few items marked way down and typically not too crowded in town - seems everyone perfers to go to the malls early morning.

I may hop on the internet later to go shopping instead though.

This is the one day of the year that I absolutely refuse to go into any department store or mall or anything similar. The only shopping I might do is at the grocery store if I run out of anything.

Now, here's a conundrum: most of the posters on this thread, so far, have indicated that they will not shop on Black Friday. So where do all these crowds at the malls come from? Who is it that does all this shopping? Obviously not normal people like we-uns.

Hey, thanks for the tip, I've had my eye on those.

Sozlet and I went to one of the biggest malls around here last Friday evening, all unsuspecting (just wanted to eat out at a place near a Trader Joe's to go grocery shopping afterwards). It turned out it was their holiday kickoff with Santa lighting the tree and then going to his photo-taking area, all the trees lit up (it's a mall that pretends to look like a town), and horse-drawn carriage rides, kids free. We actually had a lot of fun, including going on the horse-drawn carriage ride, but also just absorbing the craziness and the kid playing with the zillion other kids who were there for the occasion.

I might be going out there today, not sure. I have a special extra 30% off card for Eddie Bauer Outlet this weekend only, will probably go out for that if nothing else. If there are REAL bargains I'll do it happily, but I haven't found many places that are that much more fabulous on Black Friday than any other day or the deals aren't equally available online. EhBeth, weren't you here one t-giving? Is that when you went to Garden Ridge and got some great stuff? Open to tips.

Don't buy a digital picture frame unless you can see it on display. The cheap ones have awful picture quality, they're not worth it.

I had bought a Magellan GPS last summer, before I went on my trip out west. It worked like a dream. I had no use for it until yesterday, when we had to go to my s-i-l's new place for Thanksgiving dinner. I am totally unfamiliar with the area.

Anyhow, I take out the GPS, the program refuses to load, and I get an error message, which tells me to call tech support. Naturally, tech support is closed on Thanksgiving day. So I go to Mapquest, and plot out a route.

My husband is furious. Ever since his Nikon crapped out on him in the Painted Desert, he has been railing at technology. Today I called Magellan, and they told me to send it back to them so that they will fix it. That does not satisfy him. He tells me to go back to Costco, and get another one. For those who don't know, one of the joys of Costco is that you can return something if you are unhappy with it, for any reason. I figured that I would get an exchange.......................next week, during the week.

He is carrying on that he wants the thing returned today. Now I told you all that I would not be caught dead in the stores on Black Friday, mostly because of the horror in the parking lots. But he says that there won't be a problem at Costco. So, I told him that if he thinks that there is no problem, he should be delighted to take me to the store. :wink:

Stay tuned.......................

Costco is having a sale too, and they're in the flat-screen TV market, so they'll be busy.

I have to buy a GPS. I almost ordered one from circuit city this morning, they have good deals on them....but I'm going to wait until after xmas, since I know I'll be getting gift cards to best buy like I do every year.

Slappy- Be careful about Circuit City. I suppose that the brick and mortor store is ok, but if I were you, I would avoid buying online there.

I had been doing some research (for an LCD TV) and I read some horror stories of experiences with buying online at Circuit City that would curl your hair!

Thanks, didn't know that. I'm not buying anything from them anyway.

Hmm...........I think that I will start a thread on the subject of online shopping!

Well, I had all the intention of going to spend the night outside of Best Buy with some friends from school. We had a soccer game so we'd part at around 11pm to meet a friend there. We called him at 11pm, he had arrived an hour earlier and there were already 800 people in front of him so we decided not to go.

Now a question regarding US line etiquette/rules. If we would've gone would we have been able to cut line and stand along our friend or kicked back 'til the end of the line?

Wait overnight to save a few bucks? Stupid.

That's what Ebay is for.

I'm so much happier sitting here in my pajama's drinking coffee!

I've got a great 2.00 GPS. They don't call it that though, they call it a map.

It was not only a few bucks, but many bucks ($400 x 2). And also it was for the experience one can only get when waiting in line with friends, I had my guitar and texas hold'em kit ready.

Plus, I'm afraid of ebay.

That really got me laughing. For years, I did perfectly fine with a road map. Now I need a "tech nanny" to tell me how to get to places!

Seriously though, when I was on my western trip, it really helped. We missed a turn, and the GPS got us right back on the road. We would have been driving around and around if it weren't for the GPS.

Another thing. In Florida, you never know whether an entrance to the highway will be on the right or the left. I have never seen any highway system so dysfunctional in my entire life. They tell you where the entrance is three feet before you have to turn, and you are on the wrong side, with traffic streaming all around you. For this alone, the GPS is worth gold!

There is something I actually need to buy this weekend. It's for me right now, not a Xmas present. But I absolutely refuse to go near any retail store today. Tomorrow afternoon, maybe. Or Sunday. But not on this blackest of all black days.