Wednesday, December 3, 2003

A seasonal mistake: After thanksgiving

By MICHAEL BOYLAN
mboylan@TheCitizenNews.com

I made a mistake last Friday and went shopping.

I guess I got swept up by the alleged low prices in all of the flashy circulars that came with the newspaper on Thanksgiving. I thought that I would get up early and beat the crowds, especially since it was raining cats and dogs. I had to get up eventually, because I had to go to work, but I thought that other people would wait it out a little bit, sleep off the remaining tryptophan and start shopping at 8 or 9 a.m.

I was wrong. Very, very wrong.

The parking lots in front of Target, Wal-Mart, Toys R’ Us and Best Buy (my destination) were jammed. There were limited open spaces and drivers were racing around trying to find the closest one, so that they could be out of the rain three seconds faster. I wore a hat and parked a few buildings down, avoided the drivers of the Parking Lot 500 and waded through the throng of people smoking under the overhang of the store.

I entered and the world changed from dull and gray, with the only sound coming from the whisper of the rain, to a bright, noisy, crowded scene with conversations (many on cellphones) battling hip-hop-flavored Christmas carols. The line to the registers clogged up both sides of every aisle. I had to slip between people to get into the horizontal aisles to browse through CDs and DVDs and each time I did, people looked at me as if I had violated some sacred code of shopping honor.

Doubt crept in to my mind instantly. Why was I doing this? Why was I here? I couldn’t even remember what in that circular had me so interested in coming to this store at the crack of dawn. I thought that if I could just browse through all of the aisles, I would see what I came for and the price would be so low that this trip would not have been in vain. Was it one of the few CDs marked down to $7.99? No. A video game? No. Wait, it was a DVD!

I made the journey from the CD aisles over to the DVD aisles, searching for the DVD that Sabine and I wanted to buy for a family member. (I can’t tell you which one because my family reads my column each week. In fact, they’re reading this right now. Hello.) Anyway, it wasn’t where it was supposed to be. I then decided that it must be in another section of the DVDs. I looked high and low and didn’t find it. After 30 minutes in the store, half of it spent trying to get through hundreds of people with carts full of gifts, I started the long journey to the exit. Eventually, I made it out, but not before reaching some very important conclusions.

First, shopping on the day after Thanksgiving is stupid. Sure, there may be a few good deals, but this is just a scam perpetrated by big business and the government. Over the years, we have been convinced that we just have to shop the day after Thanksgiving to get the best deals and to help our economy. The thing is, the deals will be back before Christmas anyway and most products aren’t even on sale. Even if you find something $3 or $4 dollars off the regular price, was it worth the hassle of waking up before “Good Morning America,” and driving in a torrential downpour to a parking lot filled with hundreds of other half-awake maniacs, all so you can stand in line for an hour?

Secondly, the purchasing of DVDs is silly. This is the biggest scam, ever. Now, I own DVDs and I even have some on my wish list for this year, but they are either box sets of films like the Indiana Jones Trilogy or The Simpsons’ Season Three (hint, hint!). What Hollywood has made the public believe is that they really are going to want to watch Rodney Dangerfield in “Ladybugs” or Ben Kingsley in “Gandhi” enough times to justify spending anywhere from $10-$25. Both are fine movies, for what they are, but there is a thing called cable and also a place called the video store. There is even Netflix, which is the one of the best things in the world, but that is a story for another day. Plus, each DVD promises all of these great extras, but do you really need to hear commentary from Jennifer Lopez about how much fun she had making “Maid in Manhattan” or watch the alternative ending to “Porky’s II?”

Lastly, though our hearts are in the right place and we wish to show our love with the purchasing of gifts we think our loved ones will like, one doesn’t need to spend copious amounts of money to express love. I’m not saying that I’m not buying presents for my loved ones, and I sure as heck am not saying that I don’t want gifts this Christmas (“Simpsons Hit and Run,” hint, hint!). but maybe the real gifts this year should be being more thoughtful and nicer to my family and expressing love in March and May and August and not just on Dec. 25 for an hour or so. Every Christmas special preaches the true meaning of Christmas and that the real gift is love, but we forget it the minute the credits start rolling and head for the mall. We are insane.

Anyway, I’m running out of typing space on my PDA and it’s almost my turn to check out, so bye for now. Merry Christmas and Happy Shopping!