Friday Blue

Black Friday

Have no fear, gentle readers. I’m not dead. Nor was I swallowed up by the hoards on Friday. I’m made of tougher stuff. Having worked a theme park job for two summers in a row (Fourth of July and Christian Concert Day, anyone?), and also surviving the launch of the Numbtindough Gii just a few days before (that’s a separate post that’s so long I might never get around to posting it), Black Friday (or, as one very confused customer called it, Friday Blue) was a cakewalk.

Of course, with Christmas being closer, people were much pissier than usual. “I want to see a manager!” seems to be the shopping credo for many of the good folks in the Supercity X area. The girls at the register took the brunt of it, mostly because they don’t know how to “play dead” when a rabid soccer mom or stereotypical Supercity male (rotund, hairy, moustache, and thick accent) comes careening their way. I mean, no matter how you say, “I’m sorry, sir, but you bein’ ignint,”—it just seems like that would only make things worse. Fuel to the fire. Best thing to do is just smile sweetly and take the wind out of their sails.

But all the smiling in the world couldn’t help me with one customer.

An older man in a beret approaches me at the Numbtindough Gii station I’m manning. He’s pleasant and friendly and asks me several questions about the system and how the wireless controls work. I explain as best as I can (“There are sensors! Sensors inside this thing that sense what you’re doing with the controller!”). He asks me about the new Selda game. I tell him a little bit about it.

“You see,” he says to me, “We have a grandson in Central America who heard about this video game system and he said nothing would make him happier than getting a Numbtindough Gii and the new Selda game.”

I smiled sweetly at the touching story and thought quickly of a few things that might actually make him happier than getting a toy, but those thoughts went away when the gentleman called his wife…Mama…over.

“How much is?” she asked in a very thick foreign accent.

“Is—er—it’s two-fifty.”

“Ah. And with tax. Is two-eighty, no?”

“More like two-seventy.”

“Ahh. Two-seventy. And this…this Selda. How much is?”

“Fifty. All the Gii games are fifty dollars each.”

“And with tax is fifty-five. And plus the two-seventy is…” She mutters to herself, doing the math.

“Is more than three hundred dollars! For toy.”

A disgusted, superior look washes over her. She raises a finger and wags it at me.

“No! NO! We do NOT want! We buy things for poor grandchild in third world! We do not SPEND our money on this! Is TOY. Is ca-ca! Is for rich people in Ameeee-dica! We go!” She sweeps out of the store.

Papa says softly, “She will change her mind,” and follows.

I’m left standing there completely dumbstruck, eyes wide, but sweet smile still plastered to my face.

I mean, what was I supposed to do? I thought carefully about what Mama had just said. She was absolutely right. When your rent is almost $2,000 a month, you don’t have a lot of money to just throw around. And still, I set aside a couple hundred bucks to buy games and accessories for my new gizmo—a toy that will keep me entertained and sedate instead of getting my butt out there and making a difference for the world!

An abrupt wake-up call.

NOW I’m ready to really celebrate Thanksgiving. Where’s the turkey?