Black Friday Misadventures

So, this morning I went out to get some more doll supplies.

We weren't in desperate OMG NEED NOW straits or anything, but we had some Black Friday Doorbuster coupons for all of the local craft stores, and figured that saving money was better than not saving money. Since we weren't actually in need, we decided to also not make a big deal out of it; if I was awake to go use the coupons before they expired at noon, then great; if not, no big deal.

As it turns out, I was not only awake, I was awake before my alarm went off. My alarm goes off at 7:20 AM every business day, and because it's on my phone, it doesn't recognize holidays. Because I have ADHD, I don't turn it off ever, because "turn it off for Thanksgiving, then turn it back on" would actually become "turn it off for Thanksgiving, forget that it exists, not notice anything over the weekend because it shouldn't go off then anyway, and oversleep Monday because your alarm isn't on." So instead, I just wake up at 7:20, disable the alarm for the day, and go back to sleep.

Today, I was up for no apparent reason at 6:40am. When my alarm went off and I hadn't gone back to sleep, I figured that I might as well get up and go shopping.

I learned something important about the mall at 8:00am on Black Friday (we live pretty far from major shopping areas out here in western Massachusetts). Most of the people who are up at 4am for the doorbusters have done what they needed to do, and most of the people who don't care enough to get up at 4am, but still want to shop Black Friday sales, haven't gotten out of bed yet. I expected to park at least two time zones away from any reasonable mall entrance and ended up getting a spot fairly close to the one store in the mall I actually needed. An SUV passed me on my walk to the mall, right next to a perfect "splash the unsuspecting shopper and drench her clothing" puddle - but it slowed down and avoided the water, leaving me dry and happy. I was feeling pretty zen about the whole experience already, and I hadn't even gotten into the mall yet!

A.C. Moore (one of the local craft stores) was pleasantly busy but not packed, and I was able to get to the yarn section and procure my goods with no trouble at all. There was a bit of a wait at the register, while the people in front of me sorted out their transaction, but I was feeling so very mellow that it took me a while to realize two very important things that a stressed-out, harrowed veteran of Black Friday would probably have noticed - and complained about - immediately:
 - this group wasn't going to be finished in time to vote in the next election; and
 - there were 5 other lines open, one of which was OPEN.

Once the third employee came to help this family understand why doorbusters are in fact NOT covered by the 30% off coupon, and that the coloring kits they wanted were IN FACT doorbuster items, and that the item is even pictured in the doorbuster flyer both in print and online, and THAT'S why they couldn't use the coupon on the coloring kits, I noticed that I'd be waiting for some time if I didn't evaluate my options. So I moved over to the next aisle, where someone was just receiving their change and "have a good day" from the cashier, and completed my transaction.

I don't know how the coloring kit saga ended. I do know that when I left, the supervisor was working the register, presumably overriding the sales to accommodate the customers. Hey retailers, I've worked Black Friday and I understand dealing with harrowed customers who misunderstand the sales, but there was no crowd of waiting shoppers, the customers weren't actually angry (confused and disappointed, but not unstable), and you couldn't possibly have been any more clear in your advertising and labeling. Stick to your guns. (Okay, rant's over.)

I also know that I walked out with a $17 purchase that had been itemized on about 17 dollars' worth of receipt paper. Really? I bought 12 skeins of DMC black #310 and you feel the need to list each one individually, with the discount taken line by line? Yes, it's helpful to see that it was 36 cents and that I saved 11 cents, but you can say "hey, you did this 12 times, by the way", you don't need to give me a pedigree of my embroidery floss.

So in closing, the secret to Black Friday is:
 - Wake up kind of early. Not TOO early, but don't sleep until noon either.
 - Expect to walk. Expect to wait. Take a ball of yarn to amuse yourself while you wait in line.
 - Remember your coupon. Remember to READ your coupon.
 -  Eat breakfast! I didn't, and I was hungry enough to eat a cow by the time I got home.

 -- Jenn