Black Friday; A Christmas Story

                                           
                                                    Black Friday
                                                A Christmas Story

                                                by Adrian Lightwolf


  It all began innocently enough when, during the Thanksgiving Day gorging and subsequent tryptophan induced coma, my wife asked me, in my moment of weakness, if I would take her to work in the morning and would I, while I was there anyway, pick up one of those X-Box thingys for our grandson. I must have complied for I suddenly awoke from my coma (I had had ALOT of turkey) to find myself standing outside at 4:30 AM, in 18 degree weather, in my slippers, brushing snow off the car, and my wife, yelling at me from inside the warmth of the car, to hurry or she'll be late, and I vowing, as I got in the car, that NEXT year we're having Ham dammit! I stepped on the gas and we headed for that special little corner of Hell...Wal-Mart.

  When we pulled into the parking lot and slowly drove through the sea of cars and trucks, mostly trucks, that had arrived before us, my heart sank as I realized that this was going to be a stellar day and I was going to have to deal with a shitload of rednecks. Damn!
  Now I don't usually have a problem with people in general as long as they are few, but a crowd like this, and at 4:45 AM? Shit! I am not now, have never been, and will never be, a morning person, so lets just say that "does not play well with others" is a pretty accurate description, after all, I didn't learn to say "screw you" in 17 different languages for nothing, fortunately, I'm fluent in Redneck and felt fairly confident that I could handle just about anything. Right.

  We parked the car and as we walked into "The Store", my wife reminded me of my mission, gave me a peck on the cheek, then left me to clock in and start her day while I just stood in the doorway and stared in awe at the mass of humanity already in place, milling aimlessly about, patiently waiting for the "dinner" bell to ring promptly at 5:00 AM and their chance to scarf up the goodies.

  As I began moving through the crowd, I was thinking to myself, "Holy Shit! I MUST be insane! Here I am in the middle of the seventh circle of Hell at this ungodly hour, surrounded by a thousand rednecks, probably armed and ready to fight over ANYthing, and I'm going to try for an X-Box?! Poke me with a fork people, I'm done, and me without my taser..shitfire!"
  I slowly waded through the "great unwashed", pajama clad and smelling of yesterdays beer, turkey and giblets, softly muttering to each other like a huge flock of vultures waiting for their chosen target to finally breathe it's last, when suddenly, there before me, in all it's plastic and paper clad glory, was the pallet upon which were neatly stacked the X-Box 360's. My relief was almost overwhelming for it was mere seconds before the "fun" started! Be still my heart...
  It was at that moment that I heard the loudspeakers ring out, "IT'S OFFICIALLY 5:00 AM CUSTOMERS...BEGIN!"

  I have seen and experienced many things in my 50 years of life, some good, some not so good, but I can honestly say that I have never, ever before seen what I saw that day. The very second the word "BEGIN!" rang throughout the store, chaos of unbelievable proportions erupted all around me, and as I stood there, dumbfounded, witness to the ludicrous scene unfolding before me, I was suddenly reminded of Romero's "Dawn of the Dead" as a multitude of hands ripped and tore at the plastic and paper covering the pallets, quickly revealing the tasty delights hidden within, then watching as these once human "things" ran off, clutching their prizes to their bosoms and snarling viciously at those hapless souls that dared venture too close . The only thing missing was the blood, the gore, and the guts...well...almost.

  When the feeding frenzy abated somewhat, I was finally standing beside the pallet that, mere moments before, had held one hundred of the X-Box's I was seeking and now there were but four. I reached down, picked one up and started to examine my acquisition when an elbow suddenly slammed into my side and I found myself staring into the angry eyes of a woman who was trying to pry the damn thing out of my hands! "I SAW IT FIRST!" she yelled at me, then promptly elbowed me again! While she pried at the box in my hands screaming, "MINE! MINE!" my vision blurred, I saw little red dots floating before my beleaguered eyes, as the mob mentality of everyone around me flooded my already overtaxed mind, I had a sudden and powerful urge to rip off one of her arms and beat her soundly about the head and shoulders with it, but came out instead with, in fluent Redneck, "Screw you Bitch!! Get your own!!" and knocked her hands off MY X-Box!

  Triumphant, clutching the X-box tightly with my left arm, I indicated with my free hand that she should look up as I pointed toward the ceiling with my middle finger, and with an evil grin on my face, I turned and made my way to the closest checkout as quickly as I could, paid my money and left the pits of Hell to those doomed souls still trapped within. With amazing alacrity, considering the state of my poor bruised and battered ribs, I made my way to my car, balefully watching everyone that came near me, clutching the prize under my arm ever so tightly with each person I passed.

  A few anxious and rather jittery moments later, I reached my car, quickly popped open the trunk, ever so gently placed my painfully won bounty inside, and slammed the lid. With the X-Box safely ensconced in the trunk, I made certain that no one had followed me, looking deep into the shadows, checking under the car (well...ya never know) and finding no wild eyed, psychotic female about to pounce, I was able to relax somewhat. I glanced down at my watch and discovered, to my utter amazement, that this entire fiasco had taken but 10 minutes. Unbelievably, It was exactly 5:10 AM!
 
    Hotdamn! My wife owed me BIG time and believe me, I collected when she got home that night. She broke the Teddy out of moth ball limbo, dusted it off, and though it didn't fit as well as it use to, that didn't matter, she didn't wear it for long anyway,...if you know what I mean..*wink wink*.

  There'll be no more "Black Friday" shopping days for THIS guy! I'm gettin' too old for this shit.

  HO HO HO! Happy Holidays my ass....