Happy Turkey Day

Ok so this one is a bit late.

Happy Thanksgiving anyway. I hope that you and your family had a lovely dinner.

Happy Black Friday then!

For those of you heading out to begin your Christmas Shopping…

May God have mercy on your soul!

I used to enjoy going to Malls on Black Friday. I’d go with friends and we’d shop the day away, it was a good time and while crowded, it was just the right amount of crowding.

Then about a decade or so ago, Black Friday shopping crossed a threshold where it simply wasn’t any fun anymore. People aren’t into the holiday spirit, they’re into finding the deals FOR THEM. No-one says Merry Christmas anymore, they say Happy Holidays or Thank you and that’s it.

Christmas decorations have become more and more “Politically Correct” and protesters of various stripes are to be seen at shopping centers. The combination has bled all the fun right out of the season.

I used to like going to malls during this season to see how each mall decorated. Their creativity or whimsy was a joy to see, and much like the old Macy’s / Gimbels rivalry, attracted people to the malls to shop and enjoy the decorations.

Now, it’s all homogenous. Everything looks the same, one mall is like another so what’s the point of making a trek to a mall that’s 20 miles away when the one that’s 5 miles away is exactly the same. It probably doesn’t help that many of the malls are owned by the same consortium. 

My point is, politics, special interests, and “Political Correctness” has taken what used to be a fun season and turned it into a hollow, insincere, boring, and in some cases tasteless, version of itself. I am less and less interested in the season and even now one day one, I look forward to it being over.

Last year, most of what little Holiday Shopping I did was done online. I tried shopping once at a mall, not on Black Friday and it was so awful with parking, crowds, and bad tempered people that I simply left the place empty handed. Spending money shouldn’t be a scrimmage line activity, it should be a pleasurable experience.

When you give a gift you should be thinking about the joy it will give someone, not the nasty people you had to endure to obtain the gift.

I think that’s why so much commerce is being done onlline. It may not be about the deals, it’s about not having to interact with assholes. 

Shopping in front of my computer is a hell of a lot easier than fighting for parking. (I also don’t have to get up early, get dressed, or deal with traffic.)

Which brings me to my second point. In a season that’s supposed to be about peace on earth and good will towards men (generically meaning mankind, everyone, all homo sapiens) we’re separated by commerce and our technology instead of being happy and uniting.

I suspect this means in the future we’ll see much more bad behavior, simply because we’re all forgetting how to interact in a reasonable way with each other. 

I honestly don’t know what the solution is. If you stopped e-commerce there would surely be riots at malls across the country. However, it appears that as I’m writing this mini-riots are breaking out over children’s toys.

I know it’s a kinda of a dystopian view but I’m calling it as I see it.

So if you’re out shopping, try to enjoy yourself. Remember that you’ve got about a month to find that perfect gift in the store, and failing that, you can sit naked in front of your computer and have that perfect gift drop shipped from China directly to the recipients door.

Try to enjoy the people you’ve chosen to be with this holiday weekend.

Remember, This season is supposed to be about kindness, and family.

Just my two cents…