Arkansas Blog

I just got back from WalMart to buy a 42" flat screen TV. I can report that at least the Benton WalMart was crazy packed!

Hubby and I got off the Christmas merry-go-round years ago when we saw how ho-hum most of the grands were about 'most everything. Mom can get them the hot stuff and we send 'em the money we would otherwise have wasted. Let them fight the crowds, or as happened more and more recently, apply it to car, upkeep and insurance.
Bah humbug? You got that right.

Support your oppressors! Don't think for yourself. Pay no attention to the man behind the screen. Pull the wool over your own eyes. Be an over-man, kick ass!

www.adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd

"Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will do the most wickedest of things for the greatest good of everyone."
John Maynard Keynes

Quit the xmas BS many years ago. It's been hijacked by greed kings. Worthless crap bought with hard-earned dollars (or better yet, a smoking hot credit card). I'll just enjoy my two-week winter vacation on the Rio Grande's Lower Canyons.

My gift to the family this year will be another month in a warm, lighted house. We don't make plans further out than that and just keeping what we have is all that I can give them.

Black Friday? It won't be if there are more like me.

Jesus wept, fed the hungry, or had his feet washed.. he didn't go shopping.

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2008/11/28/2008-11-28_worker_trampled_to_death_at_long_island_.html

A worker died after being trampled and a woman miscarried when hundreds of shoppers smashed through the doors of a Long Island Wal-Mart Friday morning, witnesses said.
The unidentified worker, employed as an overnight stock clerk, tried to hold back the unruly crowds just after the Valley Stream store opened at 5 a.m.
Witnesses said the surging throngs of shoppers knocked the man down. He fell and was stepped on. As he gasped for air, shoppers ran over and around him.
"He was bum-rushed by 200 people," said Jimmy Overby, 43, a co-worker. "They took the doors off the hinges. He was trampled and killed in front of me. They took me down too...I literally had to fight people off my back."
Nassau County Police are still investigating and would not confirm the witness accounts. Police did say there were several injuries but weren't more specific.
Jessica Keyes was among the shoppers. She told the Daily News she saw a woman knocked down just a few feet from the dying worker.
"When the paramedics came, she said 'I'm pregnant,'" Keyes said.
Paramedics treated the woman inside the store and then, according to Keys, told the woman:
"There's nothing we can do. The baby is gone."

snip

There is nothing that can get me out of bed before the sun comes up and I hate crowds...I also don't want to take the chance on my fellow man trampling me to death in there rush to get that $399 HDTV.

I'm proud to say I am 45 and I think I have gone to the "Black Friday" sales maybe 3 times in y life.
Hell, I hardly even shop in an actual store anymore, I love the internet.

I've just about finished collecting my items to be wrapped under the tree. And I did it all with a few clicks from my mouse. No congested stores, mall, or parking lots; mission accomplished in minutes rather hours, incredible selection, easy searching for the best prices, and delivered to my front door, often for free. Thank you cyberspace!

after last year, i cannot remember either thanksgiving or christmas because my health was so marginal, i really now understand that all that is necessary is my wife and son at home for dinner. there is damn sure no reason for someone to be hurt or killed in the need for the greed to aquire of more stuff. my son wasn't even able to get here till late yesterday afternoon but he got here and it was great to have a lot of food and we were all healthy with nothing but the usual problems and that is great.

We can all rest easy now. Since American consumer greed is so great as to kill a worker to get into Wal-Mart, we got nothing to fear but the mobs lining up for sales the day after Thanksgiving. That poor 34 year old man displayed with the loss of his life that when the chips are down Americans go shopping! Today shows the economic melt-down has bottomed out and we gots nothing but blue skies ahead. If someone would just kill getting their hands on a copy of Arkansas Times, Max's readership would go up 10 fold. Such a great marketing ploy......think it over Max...it could be your chance for journalistic riches untold.

I am so harassed by the rush of digital shoppers in my internet Black Friday shopping. I got a copy of Annie Leibovitz at Work for $15.00 off Publisher's retail for my niece's birthday on the 28th.

A site called peppergifts.com gave me a Maui Floral Scenic Tabasco Golfshirt for my great nephew at $20 off the normal retail and free shipping with USPS Priority Mail.

You do not have go and fight the crowds and elbow through a crush to get deals this weekend.

Try these (gleaned from a NYT article) for coupons, deals and discounts:
http://www.retailmenot.com/
http://www.fatwallet.com/
http://www.thebudgetfashionista.com/
http://www.couponmom.com/
http://couponcode.com/

And click for some great gift ideas

P.S. Don't forget Amazon.com used or new alternates for Books, CD's, DVD's that's how I got $15 off on the Annie Leibovitz

Lost another comment out there in space...............

damn, no fun anymore

just hit and miss, hit and miss..............

Saw King Tut in New Orleans....'76...'77

P.P.S. PVNasby, you go.

I was writing on this reply and had to go help hang the last ornaments on the tree and a couple of wreathes for my Mom, 99. The delay caused me to miss your post.

We always use my Christmas visit to unpack and set-up her sixty-nine year collections of ornaments and Christmas bric-a-brac.

Happy Holidays to All and to all a good afternoon.