Today is the day after Thanksgiving (at least in America) . . . today is Black Friday. *shutters* I have only made the mistake once of going to the mall on Black Friday. I live in a small town, bare 28,000 people, probably closer to 32,000 when you add in the surrounding rural towns. "How bad could it be?" I thought to myself . . . HA, was I wrong. It took almost an hour on the highway to travel the distance what usually takes 2 minutes. The parking lot was so full, that cars were parking in the empty lot, commonly known as "the homeless camp". A day that's supposed to kick off the Christmas shopping season as well as all the Christmas spirit only seemed to bring out anger and frustration as the mall was literally bursting at the seams with people. After finally getting a parking place, which played out like a vicious game of spoons, the line just to get into the mall took almost a full 20 minutes. I don't like crowds. There is a good reason why I don't like crowds and that is I'm not a tall person. My eye level is usually wear people hold bags and coffee. A trip to a busy place usually results in me weaving and dodging out of the way of "GAP" bags (which are way too big to begin with) and mall food. Add in about 40% more people into that crowd and you get one tiring day. Ironically, neither my father or myself actually bought a gift that day because of the shear pandemonium that was going on around us. Once we pulled out of the parking lot, I breathed a sigh of relief that I survived.
That experience happened a few years ago and I swore I would never go shopping ever on Black Friday again. Because of that, I've found myself not really paying attention to all the massive sales and hype that goes on around this so-called-commercial-holiday. One thing I have been noticing in the last two years or so is what the online retailers are doing to hype Black Friday. They can't do door-buster sales or open their doors five hours earlier than usual . . . they're online, it's the same old shopping experience as the day before . . . or is it?
Amazon probably had one of the more interesting Black Friday sales, timed deals opening every hour on the hour with a limited amount available. Once sold out, the item reverted back to its original price. I was shocked at some of the deals going on, like the complete series of 24 for $99.99 - if my math is right, buying all seven seasons should come out to around $349.99 - wow. That deal sold out in less than 30 minutes. The best thing about it . . . you didn't have to wait until Black Friday to get the deals, they started early Thanksgiving morning.
I have to admit I was curious about all the deals and ended up getting sucked in a bit as I left the computer all day on Thanksgiving, refreshing every hour just to see what new deals they were offering. While, I didn't actually buy anything from Amazon, I did cash in on some deals at RightStuf.com which is the site I buy my Anime and Manga from. I got a pretty good deal in fact too.
I'm grateful for the Internet and all the online retailers letting me enjoy the spirit of Black Friday without having to tackle some old grannie for the last copy of Uncharted 2 or some other blockbuster item. Plus, I don't have to worry about getting trampled to death either . . . a plus anyway you look at it.
