NEW AND IMPROVED

This blog is now sugar FREE, fat FREE, gluten FREE, all ORGANIC and all NATURAL!!

Saturday, November 16, 2013

BLACK FRIDAY


BLACK FRIDAY

A cranky opinion for “Cranky Opinion Saturday”

The following is the opinion of a cranky old man.  Opposing opinions are welcome, they are wrong but still welcome…and please, no name calling, and that means you, you big stupid head!

 

I almost get the “Black Friday” thing.  I know several people who look forward to Black Friday.  It is a tradition, they shop together and it is a bonding thing.  Sure it seems ridiculous to me.  I do not understand waiting until midnight after Thanksgiving and then storming the stores for bargains, but then I don’t understand getting up at 4 am to play golf, shoot birds, or catch fish.  Lots of people do that stuff.  As I get older I learn that just because I don’t understand something it does not make it wrong…sometimes.

I have to draw the line at opening up stores and shopping at 7 am Thanksgiving Day.  It is wrong, and it is stupid.  Why not push Black Friday back to Veteran’s Day Monday?  Why?  Because that would be disrespectful of course.  Then why is it ok to disrespect Thanksgiving?

Beyond disrespecting a much loved holiday, and ruining dinner plans for zillions of people, the Thanksgiving Day “Black Friday” sales are a joke.  Yes, yes, you save hundreds of dollars on electronics, leather goods and all kinds of stuff, but do you really?

I am sure that a few TV’s and computers that haven’t been selling worth a hoot are suddenly almost given away, but you are buying yesterday’s stuff that no one really wants anymore.  Maybe there are a few really good deals that have the sole purpose of sucking you into the store, but unless you are the first in line, the fastest, and the most aggressive shopper in the store, you ain’t getting one.

Listen people, a sale is when a store drops the price of something that no one wants at the current price to a price that people might be willing to pay.  Stores do not put things on sale to be nice; they put them on sale to get rid of stuff that no one wants.  If the stores don’t sell everything on Black Friday, they will go back on sale later.  It happens every year.

I also think that Black Friday sale stuff is a way for stores to get rid of defective stuff.  This stuff is given away for presents.  The people that find out the stuff sucks probably don’t know where it came from or where to return it.  What a great way to dump defective shit!

Three years ago I received a Garmin GPS system for my car.  It was a $250 bargain that was purchased for $50.  The giver purchased five of them and gave them all as gifts.  I thought this was a really great gift.

I tried to use my Garmin, but could not figure it out.  It never reacted to an instruction the same way twice.  It gave weird directions and changed them mid travel.  I thought it was me.  Mrs. C is really good with this kind of technology.  Mrs. C. could not figure it out.  We loaned the Garmin to a friend who was taking a trip.  Actually we told her she could have it.  It was returned with as I recall a comment something along the lines of,

“Thank you so much, but this piece of shit sucks!”

I tossed the Garmin.  It was beyond frustrating though I first busted it “Gallagher” style with a sledge hammer, and that was fun.  I subsequently found out that the other four gifts met a similar fate.  None were returned.  In effect the store got $250 instead of $0.00 for some defective crap.  What a great bargain!

So all you whack-a-doodles, get up early on the 28th.  Join the crowd. Risk getting trampled to death, demean yourself, ruin a really great holiday, miss watching the Lions get slaughtered, be my guest.  You will save nothing, there will be other better “sales” before Christmas, and you will possibly be buying crap.

Me?

I’m going to be enjoying a terrific feast, enjoying the company of family and friends, enjoying a post turkey coma nap, and perhaps even a glass of cognac and a really good cigar.  On Friday I will be recovering from all the above, and then enjoying another feast of Thanksgiving leftovers and some more football.

The preceding is the opinion of a cranky old man, and not necessarily that of management…Mrs. Cranky.  

13 comments:

  1. i feel bad for those workers in the stores who just wanted to be able to spend time with their family and good food. instead they're putting up with idiots rudely looking for deals.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good one Joe. I will never shop on Thanksgiving and have never done the Black Friday thing. Smart shoppers know it's a scam.

    And I buy stuff when I want it, sale or no. It's just the way I'm wired.

    ReplyDelete
  3. It's a shame your Garmin didn't work. our son gifted us one a few years ago and we use it often. Of course I-phones now have apps for GPS so these aren't as important as they once were but we don't have I-phones. You make a good point about stores getting rid of all their defective merchandise. I hope you're having a happy weekend.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I'm with you all the way on this. Where is it written that all the stores can't be closed for just one day? Really, couldn't we survive it? If not there is something terribly wrong... oh wait, there IS something terribly wrong... that obsessive group behavior called mass consumption - gotta get more, gotta have more. I won't be joining the lemmings in line on Thanksgiving or the day after, and it if were possible I'd avoid all shopping until January 2nd.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Where do you get a really good cigar these days? I raise two of them to a return to the really good old holidays.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Agreed. I've never shopped on Black Friday, and I DAMN sure won't shop on Thanksgiving Day. In fact, I'll pay a PREMIUM to NOT shop on Black Friday. If my favorite store is closed on X day, I'll just go back on y day and buy what I want.

    Would a car dealer sell more cars if they were open on Sunday's? NO. They would sell the same number of cars, but just stretched out over 7 days instead of 6.

    Let the poor workers enjoy time with their families. Jeez!

    S

    ReplyDelete
  7. yeah, black friday is a crock. every time the wife has tried it whatever she bought ended up selling for less in the last weeks before Christmas. the only other reason would be to grab the hot toy before it goes out of stock. we're not trendy so that's seldom a worry.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I will be doing exactly what you'll be doing on Thanksgiving day!

    Well, minus the cigar and the football thing.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I tried Black Friday one time, just to see what all the hubbub was about. I don't see the point in elbowing your way through a crowd when you know you are not going to be one of the five people that get the very special advertised bargain.

    ReplyDelete
  10. We don't have Black Friday here, but it sounds god awful! Then again, I'm not exactly a shopper.

    ReplyDelete
  11. AMEN and thank you Cranky...I worked retail{many of them in management} the sales are not that great you can get the same crap in a few weeks for the same price. If you are a professional shopper you know this. More and more of these beautiful family traditions are being trampled to death by corporate greed it is sad. Getting up earl to go shopping on BF with a bunch of crazy ass people who end up getting int fights each year over some stupid ass xmas toy that is probably garbage anyways. Just does not sound like fun to me. I would rather be home bloated and hungover from turkey day hanging out with the family.

    ReplyDelete