Sh*t I Don't Understand: Black Friday

About 8 months ago, I delved into the topic of shopping and originally intended to include the unofficial American holiday of Black Friday, but decided to hold off until this time of year because it really warrants its own post. Someone please explain to me what the hell is so great about Black Friday shopping. I've been to malls on my share of Black Fridays and never really bought into the whole ordeal. And now that this thing has exploded to the point that people are essentially heading immediately out to the stores once the Thanksgiving pumpkin pie is finished, it's really starting to get on my nerves.

Before you say, "but Lou you idiot, don't you realize the huge sales and discounts that are out there to be had on Black Friday?" - I do realize. How can't I? Every piece of advertising anyone sees or hears during the week of Thanksgiving somehow involves a huge Black Friday blowout, as if the day after Thanksgiving is the last day that anyone will ever be able to buy holiday gifts without going bankrupt. I especially love the stores that have the descending discounts as time goes by during the morning, i.e. before 6am you get 40% off, between 6-8 you get 25%, between 8-10 you get 10%, etc. What a joke. You know where I like to be at 6am on Black Friday? Asleep in bed. The last place I'd ever want to be is standing in 30-degree weather waiting for the doors to open at Kohl's or some other dumpy store so I can stampede in with the rest of the herd and jockey for position to save an ultimately inconsequential amount of money. On that note, let's also not forget the 2008 trampling incident at a Long Island Wal-Mart that resulted in an employee's death.

The root of it is that some people place such little value on their time or have no concept of valuing their time altogether. I don't care if I'm apparently a sucker for paying slightly higher prices for gifts because I miss out on these supposedly phenomenal Black Friday deals. Avoiding the throngs of frantic people, the long lines, the traffic, and any other aggravating thing you can think of is well worth it. Of course, there are exceptions - I have a friend who spent 10 hours or so overnight between Thanksgiving and Black Friday in front of a Target last year but got in as soon as they opened and saved something like $250 on an HD TV. If you break it down, that's essentially valuing your time and relative comfort at $25 an hour, which is pretty fair if you ask me. But how many people actually get the kind of deal (on a worthwhile product, mind you) that really computes into a figure that justifies their time and effort?

Another thing we're assured of on Black Friday is the mind-numbing local news coverage that night. You always see some overweight and inarticulate mongo yelping at the camera, bragging about whatever deals they got, and how "I gots all ma shoppin' done ta-day!" Oh really, Lennie, did you? You're telling me you got all your Christmas shopping done today? I'm here to dispute that fact. No matter how much stuff they do buy, no one gets all their shopping done on Black Friday. You know why? Because there's still a month or so left before Christmas; and as December goes on, our consciousness becomes dominated by Christmas songs, cookies, Ralphie Parker, Rudolph, Santa, etc. That, in turn, compels many people to get back out there for "just a few more things here and there," because they want to immerse themselves in the onslaught of holiday cheer - no one wants to feel uninvited to the party. So even if you end up "getting all your shopping done on Black Friday," chances are you will end up spending even more money in the subsequent weeks.

In conclusion, I don't want to come off like a grinch, but I do believe that Black Friday in Western culture is one of the things about life on our planet that causes the aliens to never really stick around when they visit Earth. I'm not telling anyone not to go out and shop to their heart's content this Friday (after all, what do I care, I'll be at work). But just take it with a grain of salt and maybe, just maybe, think to yourself - is voluntarily subjecting myself to all these unsavory people and uncomfortable situations really worth it?

Sh*t I Don't Understand: Shopping

Need any further evidence at all that males and females are different species? Look no further than the shopping mall. We all need to go to the mall at some point, whether it be to buy holiday or birthday presents, or some new work clothes, or (gritting my teeth) shoes. Some people treat this consumer experience as a necessary evil, a pain-in-the-ass of an afternoon that can not end quickly enough. Others, well, they treat this as a sacred pastime. They're not just going out to "buy stuff." No, they're going shopping, which is a totally different animal - an animal that I just do not get.

Go to the profile of any female friend you have on Facebook and there are good odds that her interests will include "Shopping!" They even have shopping uniforms. Uniforms, you say? Think about it. You can imagine thousands of girls with money to burn going through the same checklist on a Saturday afternoon before hitting malls all across the country. Uggs? Check. Sweat pants? Check. North Face fleece? Check. Gigantic sunglasses? Check. Starbucks latté? Check. And there you have it - the shopping uniform.

It's not merely the act of buying things that they really love. We could only wish it were that simple. It's the chance to spend time with these luscious items that are most likely not needed, the chance to waste a salesperson's time trying on those $500 shoes you're never going to buy just so you can amble around a store for 4 minutes pretending to be Blake Lively. It's the chance to earn bragging rights with your friends (and rivals) that you got that same pair of jeans for $5 less than they did. It doesn't matter that you spent 20 minutes trying to find a parking spot, wrestled your way through a crowd of people at the clearance rack because you scouted the location the night before and knew exactly where that pair would be, waited for a half hour in line under one of those 125-degree store lighting systems, and will spend at least another 20 minutes trying to get out of the damn parking lot. No, that doesn't matter at all. "So what if I wasted an entire afternoon? Don't you understand, I got the same pants as Jamie, for $5 less! That bitch is gonna freak out! This is gonna be great!!!!!"

It's a bit of a chicken or the egg scenario, but just look at how products aimed toward females are marketed; they have the tireless shopper eating out of their hands. Go into a womens' shoe store or a Bath and Body Works, and you see about 9,000 variations of the same product. The funny thing is, it's all in an effort to attract people who already own the very things in the store. "Oh, I already have 15 pairs of black heels, but isn't this pair just to die for? And oohhh, look at this new chamomile-mocha-raspberry-apple body lotion! I already have gallons of the chamomile-mocha-raspberry-orange body lotion, but I have to have this too!" Who on earth needs all this garbage? No one, in actuality. But who on earth is under the impression that they need all this garbage? Enough people to keep these places in business, apparently.

In a chain of work emails that have been since lost in the mix, I was able to confer with the blog's close friend Ryan on a topic just like this one. He put it perfectly: shopping, in many ways, is a competition for women. They not only compete with each other, but with themselves. It's the challenge of walking into a mall or shopping center and seeing how much you can buy at a supposedly reduced price. To them, missing out on a sale is like being that guy who loses $200 gambling in AC on the same night all his friends win $200 each - it's a bang-your-head-against-the-wall feeling. Collecting items is the game, and shopping is how it's played.

I'm not saying men don't shop, but when they do it is with a plan and purpose, because there is undoubtedly a game on TV to get home and catch. That's one of the major differences - for women, shopping is the game, it is the entertainment, so to walk and look around aimlessly is just a way to further enjoy it. That's why you see many women go out to buy a new leash for their dog but end up coming home with so many new clothes you'd think she were going on a third world relief mission.

Now, men can be guilty of aimless store-wandering at times, but we do so when we're surrounded by golf clubs, baseball gloves, and bats. I haven't played competitive baseball in 10 years but you better believe I'm checking out the bat rack in a sporting goods store when I walk by it. But there is a major difference: we don't hold it against the opposite sex for not being willing to share this experience with us. We don't care. The fact you don't view the baseball glove wall at Dick's the way we do is A-OK. If anything, it just means you're normal. But women? Oh man, can some of them get pissed off if their husband or boyfriend doesn't enjoy shopping with them. You never, ever see those roles reversed in a relationship. Can you picture a bunch of dudes sitting at a bar and one guy is like, "yeah, man, my girlfriend didn't want to go help me pick out a new sand wedge, I'm so mad at her." I sure can't. And ladies, it's a sad truth but I'm not going out on a big limb by saying if you have yourself a man that actually enjoys shopping with you, then you have yourself a gay man, whether he has come to such a realization or not.