Blogged
Looking greyly at Black Friday
Must…eat…brains…
Every damn year, it’s the same damn story, told in pretty much the same damn way. The economic fetishization of the day after Thanksgiving never fails to repel me on a variety of levels. First off, it’s wrapped in a lie, or perhaps just a lazy misunderstanding: it’s considered by many the busiest shopping day of the year, and it’s not. Secondly, the vaunted importance of the day is parrotted by national and local media to the point that you think you’re actually missing out on something, when all you’re missing is the opportunity to orbit your local Googleria shopping mall in a desperate search for a parking space, or the chance to be elbowed by a balding father of three while scrambling for the last XBox 360 on the shelf. Thirdly, and most irritatingly, there’s an implicit idea that this is the only thing that you should be doing, this shopping. Many people have the day off, and they haven’t the foggiest idea what to do with themselves. They already watched TV the day before. They have largely forgotten how to read. The idea of sitting and talking to one another makes them break out in hives. Fortunately, the guy on the TV screen says, “Go out and spend money! Everybody’s doing it!” And people do, no doubt with a sigh of relief. There’s a Dawn of the Dead (the original, that is) aspect to Black Friday that makes you want to board up the windows and load up the thirty-ought-six.
Or maybe it’s just me.
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Love that cynicism!
I hope, though, that the fact that I went out and bought a juicer today says nothing more about me than the fact that, well, I needed a juicer.
Have a happy weekend!
And a very happy weekend to you, Bitty!
I really have no explanation for that cynical outburst. That is, I can certainly explain the cynicism, but that it actually got out is kind of a surprise even to me.
So what kind of juices do you make? I’ve never thought of actually purchasing a juicing-o-tron.
I again avoided buying unnecessary shit this holiday. I actually had a lovely Black Friday… went to the San Diego Zoo for the first time in years, and capped it off with a night of drinking and carousing with Space Kitty and my dad (who gets funnier as I get older).
Hope you and yours had a good Thankgiving, my man.
No scurvy for me and mine this year…
I never thought I’d own a juicer (it’s just a simple $10 citrus juicer), but I had to buy one in self-defense. I may have grown a dozen and a half oranges this year, but my neighbor has two lemon trees, one orange tree, and one tangerine tree, all are heavily laden, and she plans to share generously with me this year.
Caught in the tension between wasting her gifts (how many oranges/lemons/tangerines can one eat in one week?) and doing something productive with them, I’m going to try juicing that which I can’t possibly consume each week and freezing the juice. Maybe it’ll work; maybe I’ll just end up with a bunch of freezer-damaged citrus goo.
This, for me, is an odd thread: Waveflux rants about Black Friday; The Bone seconds that and celebrates anti-Black Friday by going to the San Diego zoo; my daughter, in San Diego, eschews the Waveflux/Bone POV and tries to join the lines at WalMart on Black Friday but literally finds them curving down the street to the next mega-retailer (Von’s), so she goes and spends too much money at too early an hour somewhere else. (In her defense, Black Friday is a rare day that she can get her husband to babysit while she shops.)
It all seems connected and seems to mean something, but I don’t know what. Perhaps I’m the center of the universe? Who knew?
CR:
Excellent to hear from you! That remark about your dad is echoing in the room right now; the relationships of folks to their folks vary so much that it’s hard to derive a rule of thumb. I do believe, though, that growing older grants us the opportunity to see our parents in new ways, and it’s really a kind of gift.
That is: I like that your dad is funnier now.
My best to Space Kitty!
Bitty:
Somebody or something has to be at the center of the cosmos. I see no reason why it shouldn’t be you.
Freezing citrus juices is a pretty good idea. You can freeze them in ice cube trays, then pop the cubes into a freezer bag as this guy suggests. Check also what he says about freezing whole lemons.
WOW! Thanks for the lemon-link. I would freeze the halves but I only have a little ‘ol top-of-the-frig freezer. But the citrus ice cubes make so much sense, especially for me, who loves lemon in iced tea so much that I’ve been accused of drinking tea-flavored lemonade.
I guess I know what I’m doing with MY December!