The River Green

We’re preparing for a typical Thanksgiving this year. Mom, Jen, Brian, Jim and Lily are coming over, and there may be an appearance by one or more of our wayward friends. The turkey is provided by Lily and Co., who got it free after having spent so much money at Shop’N’Save. We put it in this morning.
Jen has to work very early on Black Friday, and will be staying until she has to leave. Hopefully everyone will be able to play games until then, or at least manage to stay lively and conversational.
The Rockettes just opened the Macy’s parade. What a great tradition that has become. I can’t help worrying that in a few short years the sight of beautiful legs will suddenly make me hungry for turkey.
Just before the guests arrive: Our plans for Black Friday haven’t changed, except we’ll probably get to where we’re going a little later than everyone else. Some places are opening at midnight. They’re messing with a fine holiday and the evil must be stopped.
Right after we ate: Dinner was great, but I think I forgot to take pictures. Oh well… they all look the same anyway! Games start as soon as the dishes are done. I’ll just close my eyes for a quick second…
Everyone’s about to go home: Jen and I are going to Best Buy for $4 flash drives and a new peripheral hard drive. Hopefully they still have some, since Best Buy was open at 10:00pm *on Thanksgiving*!!! WTF?!
The next day: Well, all the sales items that I wanted at Best Buy were gone, but I managed to snag a relatively cheap hard disk with a 500GB capacity. Marieke and I are going to Ross Park Mall for black Friday since we haven’t been there in a while. We’re not really looking for anything in particular, but if we find it, we’ll get it!
Back home on Black Friday: There was a line at least 150 cars long to get out of Ross Park Mall. They organized certain sections of the massive parking lot into guaranteed parking for $10. Not a bad idea, but we parked about 4 spaces away from all that and walked. It’s ok… we’re fine. Teavana is a really awesome shop, but all the associates work on commission, so it was hard to look at something without having your leg humped. One associate with below average looks decided that she wanted to ‘play house’ with me and began setting up a whole tea set with indications of where she would sit and where I would sit. Marieke was standing right next to me. Of course I was oblivious to the whole thing and just thought the associate was being nice. I was told that we’re not going back into that store.

Labels: black friday , holidays , Thanksgiving

After a long deliberation, we decided to cancel Thanksgiving for this year. It's just too much work. The dining room is unmanageably cluttered and we're just too tired. Jen made a point of making us feel a little on the guilty side of the matter.

We ended up taking an invitation for supper at aunt Jan and uncle Ed's house. Our contribution was Marieke's wonderful sweet potato oranges and some cranberry sauce. Mom brought bread and some wine. It was a nice evening overall.

We were expecting to see Patrick, his family and the new addition, my little second cousin once removed, whose name continuously escapes me, but it is another Irish-ish name and his middle name is Michael. Sadly, there is some strife between he and his parents and only Aiden (whose middle name I cannot remember!) came over at the last minute. It was very nice to see everyone, not even Audrey could darken the mood.

Uncle Mike called with the news that Ling delivered their new baby. Nathan is his name and he is adorable!

At the request of aunt Jan, we left a large portion of the oranges over there so that she could take them to her mum's in Beaver, where they were planning a trip for the weekend.

Our Black Friday began at 2:30am, when the alarms went off. Our target? Samsung T401G sliding phones with full keyboard. On sale at Best Buy for $69.99 each, but they each came with $30 worth of minutes, so the actual price of the phones themselves was $39.99. We arrived at the Waterfront bright (actually not so bright since it was still dark) and early (actually, it was late for me because I hadn't yet gone to sleep), at the unholy hour of 3:17am. The line was already about 100 or so long and it started to drizzle freezing bits of rain on us while we waited for the doors to open.

The people in blue shirts came around at least twice to hand out vouchers for big ticket items such as tvs, appliances, computers, stereos, that kind of thing. We were in line waiting to buy Net10 Prepaid phones, which we learned were guaranteed to number at least ten at every store.

Jen was handing out fliers to the people in line, so when she got to where I was, we chit-chatted for a while. Then the doors opened and the chaos was toward the rear of the store and we largely avoided it. Afterward, we visited Jen for a while since she was standing in front of BB&B handing out coupons to the incoming crowds (about 3 in the twenty minutes we were standing with her!).

At last we were at home and while Marieke caught up on some z's, I transfered my contact list and played sudoku on my new phone.

Not a bad holiday weekend, all told.

Labels: black friday , family , Thanksgiving

In about 80 hours or so, our house will be filled with guests for Thanksgiving. We are expecting 8 people and a 9th for dessert. Among the rituals that are normally fulfilled during these hours is the annual clean for company exercise. While our house is far from a pigsty, it has its little corners of boxes filled with items that have yet to find a home, the ubiquitous hair ball and of course we don't get to use the dining room table on any kind of regular basis, so that is covered in various miscellanea that probably should have a permanent home. The problem isn't one of space, though this house is severely lacking in closets, which adds to the frustration of trying to clean. When it becomes necessary to stuff Aldi bags into the corner by the dog crate because there is no other place for them to live, we yearn for just one simple closet.

The problem is Black Friday and the never-ending pursuit of stuff acquisition. If I had to move out of this house tomorrow and could only take that which I have used for the past year, I could probably make one trip on a bicycle with a sturdy satchel on the rear. But that's only if I had to. Everything else has a bit of memorial significance to it which prompts me to not deposit it at the nearest Goodwill for someone else to have and hold, look at and admire. Each of these things reminds me of one event in my life or another. Photographs would most certainly make the trip with me in the bicycle. Aside from my beloved computer and a coffee mug or two and my clothes, I don't really use anything else in this house. Dishes don't count because you pretty much need them to eat off of and I could purchase a new set for very cheap at the new apartment that I would be bicycling to.

Don't get us wrong. We have made so many trip to Goodwill this year and we went on a Craig's List selling spree in the early summer. We certainly are not against ridding ourselves of the unused, non-living occupants of our house. I guess the larger question becomes why we hold so many inanimate objects close to us as though they were a living person? And then why would we choose to let them gather dust in some random corner instead of revisiting them, or stuff them into a closet?

This is not a rhetorical question it is a practical one. I remember a movie where one of the main characters was asked to house sit for her boss. When she and her boyfriend arrived to feed the cat, there was nothing but a table for the cat food and a litter box. The rest of the apartment was empty. When prompted by an inquisitive look from the boyfriend, the woman said 'He's a minimalist.'

Why can't we all be comfortable with this. I mean, of course we would need a sofa and a coffee table and a few other essential items to accommodate comfort, but what is so horrid about living with only essential things? Is it our materialist nature? Is it our fractured, lonely social order? Could we attribute this to a certain fear that our lives are completely empty without such things to bring us comfort?

I don't have an answer, nor do I yet have either an opinion or a theory.

In any case, there are far worse things I suppose we should be concentrating our analytical skills on such as where we are going to put the shit on the table, where is that attachment to the vacuum that magically removes pet hair from any surface, where is our own Billy Mays (did you know he is from Pittsburgh?) and his amazing RoboClean, which is capable of cleaning your entire house with the simple push of one button, so easy a child can operate it (cut to a child pushing a button on a devise and watching in amazement and wonderment as if it were a home work doing machine)... and the like...

Oh there is so much stuff to do. At least we found all the requested diet drinks for our guests after no less than six, yes six, stores. Now if we can only locate a single bag of Gardetto's pumpernickel rye chips to complete the recipe for chex mix, we're all set.

Labels: black friday , holidays , house , Thanksgiving