11-28-08 Friday (Possibilities)

This is the second time in my life that I can remember being off for Black Friday. The first time was several years back, and while I had intentions to go out for the doorbusters, I never made it. This time, we won't make the doorbuster stuff either. We bought a newspaper yesterday; Jim flipped through the ads and even separated them into two piles. Trash vs. Possibilities. I simply hate that these sales are right after Thanksgiving. It saddens me that so many people couldn't enjoy their holiday because they had to be at work by 5am or something stupid. Being in the RV, we don't have room for much more nor do we really need any of it. Most of the things in the sale ads of interest to us are pull-overs and slippers. It makes me happy, even relieved that this year won't be the stressful gift buying, decorating, and entertaining stresses we've grown accustomed too. Without all of that, it's truly a vacation.

We leave Idaho tomorrow, so we have one important thing we need to buy - an Idaho ornament. Luck will be better if we go to the mall for it. I'd love to find some sort of engraved potato ornament. That would be perfect. It's humorous to travel state to state, look at ornaments and discover they're sometimes exactly the same (aside from the state name) and made in China. I hate that. At times, we're lucky enough to find locally made stuff.

Ut oh, Jim must mean some serious business. It's only 9am and he's already gone into the shower. I'll tell you, that's a rarity for either one of us. Typically, we sit around for a few hours. It's as if we're resting from sleeping or something. Jim loves to shop. He loves to buy new clothes, shoes and belts. I usually wander off somewhere. I like to get in and get out. Shopping hurts my feet and back. If we shop for too long I have to find a place to sit, usually with the 80 year olds on oxygen.

Despite the news about the Wal-Mart employee being trampled to death this morning, we found the stores at about 10am unusually quiet. (A fellow Blogger's opinion sums it up well, click here.) Our first stop was Wal-Mart - surprise! There were shoppers around the door buster displays, rummaging through clothing sizes, but yet cashiers were waiting at the registers with no one in line. Maybe we missed the largest crowds or perhaps the consumer spending isn't there? Doorbuster merchandise, including flat screen TV's were everywhere. Did Wal-Mart have more stock this year, or did consumers buy less? I was shocked to see so much left. K-Mart was fairly busy, and even appeared more so than Wal-Mart. Sure, Wallyworld is bigger, but K-Mart had lines of 5 people at each register. We also stopped at a Big Lots and a Shopko. Between all the stores we stopped at, we bought several hoodies, and some sweaters. Good prices.

After big retail store shopping, we went to the mall. We never found an ornament, but Jim did get new boots. Our last stop was the Historic Downtown area, and several stores later, still no ornament. Walgreens had keychains which I can make into an ornament but I'd rather not. Most of the time, a keychain made into an ornament looks... well, like a keychain made into an ornament.

We went to Wal-Mart again. We got a keychain that looks like a potato. It's the best we can do. I bought a couple of postcards as well. That was it. Then on to Lowes and Home Depot to return some stuff. Jim bought a new toilet sprayer since our was leaking. For those of you not familiar with RV toilets, most of them come with a kitchen type sprayer on the side of the toilet. It's mostly made to help clean the toilet and for skid marks. I know, you could have lived a long time without knowing that information.

Here's a fountain statue at a roundabout near Wal-Mart. A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far.... I mean a long time ago, Idaho Falls was called Eagle Rock. I believe this statue is a tribute to that but I'm not sure. Either way it is beautiful.

OK, this was just to morbid to have on display in front of all the festive decor at Wal-Mart.

We're going to attempt to hit the road early tomorrow. It's planned to awake at 7am... See ya!