Black Friday
2006-11-27, 11:50 a.m.

My sister's boss will not let her take the day after Thanksgiving off...so, I did my sisterly duty and did lots of shopping for her during those morning hours.

I got up at four o'clock to accompany her to Wal-Mart as she was buying the wee little niece a new tv. My job was to stand by the movies and get any that I thought the nieces would enjoy.

If you haven't had the pleasure of Wal-mart early on Black Friday then I shall explain. They wrap all the super-duper sale items in black plastic and stick them in aisles throughout the stores. An associate stands by to rip the plastic off at five o'clock when the sale officially starts.

So, I am standing there and waiting. The lady next to my was drinking some kind of alcoholic beverage out of a styrofoam cup (because nothing says classy like drinking alcohol at four forty-five in the morning at Wal-Mart).

But the real fun started when the ladies standing next to the plastic wrapped block of movies began to not-so-stealthily tear away the plastic. One individual was taking movies out and placing them on the book shelf behind her.

Sadly, a manager came and stood guard until the official sale start time. I'm pretty sure that if he had left it alone...a fist fight would have started.

My sister went to work and I went to various stores with a cell phone attached to my ear as I described various articles of clothing to her.

And I bought absolutely nothing at my entertainment superstore because there were approximately eight thousand people and I just about had a nervous breakdown trying to get to the CDs.

So, lots of my sister's money was spent (as she paid me back...although she did offer me her license and credit card but considering that I had committed insurance fraud the day before by signing her name to insurance papers for her oldest, I declined the offer) and no actual fist fights were witnessed so everything evened out in the end.