pwning Black Friday

There are moments in life where you have to take a step back and take stock of your life. "Am I happy?" you ask. "Am I bored?" "Do I need more excitement?" These questions generally lead to more questions, and end whenever I tire of them. Sometimes they spur change, other times I convince myself that I am being hormonal or unstable and have a little chocolate instead of taking up knitting potholders for the homeless. But last week, some friends and I had the thought that it would be fun to go to some Thanksgiving sales, technically some kind of Black Thursday, since they were last night and not the morning ones. I jumped at the opportunity. Because, clearly, I need something to do. 

But here's the kicker. We're a week from the end of the month. Do you know what that means? This is the rice and beans week, that's what it means.  This is the toilet-paper-from-Dollar-Tree week, that's what it means. What it means is, even if the store had a sale that was like BUY A TV FOR 5 DOLLARS, I'd be like, "Ehhh...." So I signed on for an all-nighter purely for the fun of it, and also for people watching. Especially for people watching, because people be crazy. Plus, I don't need that much sleep, so the few times that my friends (who do need sleep) have a crazy idea like, let's go see a midnight movie or stand in a stampede lane, I'm like, sign me up! 

We stood in the cold outside Target, in a line of a few hundred. It got progressively colder and I was having some trouble texting because my fingers were stiff. It was SO HARD, y'all, but I am not made of weak stuff, so I persevered. I realize this: most people who stand in line at night outside a Target have a plan, and they wear running shoes and they have a ferocious look in their eyes. If I wanted to, I probably coulda got a couple sermon illustrations out of it, but I was pretty busy talking. When the doors opened, people were running and getting carts and I was wandering aimlessly around and becoming an object of derision. When you are whatever I am, and some woman with a 50 inch television in a cart almost runs you down while you are standing innocently in an aisle, watching people, then you apologize. That was my job, apologizing with my back brain while cataloging humanity with my primary brain. It was super fun, and I'm being serious. I had a blast. 

Later we drove to an outdoor mall and waited in the car whilst people lined up outside various stores. Once it got pretty close to midnight we went and joined our fellow materialistic consumer sheep and totally got free gift cards, which rocked. 

Got home around 2 am, 30 dollars richer. That's what I'm talking about, y'all. I beat the system. Next time, I hope that my ship has come in, so I can beat the system emotionally but totally buy the stuff. Next time!