I genuinely love Black Friday, more than rainbows and unicorns and babies and roasting chestnuts on an open fire. I mean, I pretty much shop like mad all year round, but on Black Friday, you are supposed to shop, so there is less guilt involved. Here is the list of things I bought over the last few weeks under the guise of Black Friday shopping:
- Corelle Livingware Garden Sketch Band dinner set from Amazon for $18 (love Corelle dishes to serve my hot dogs and corn nuts in my Kentucky trailer home)
- Fiskar rotary cutter (for my inner Martha Stewart and also because I needed something $7 to add to the dinner set above to hit $25 so I can use my $5 off $25 coupon from Amazon. This shopping thing - it's very complicated)
- Plantronic M50 bluetooth headset for $20
- Two Maroo iPad cases for $22 and $15 respectively (why two? Cuz a wise man once said two is always better than one, and more is always more)
- Harry Potter 8-film blu ray collection from Amazon UK for $35 (I am an international shopper, and it seems appropriate to buy Harry Potter from the UK)
- Brave blu ray from Walmart for $9 (no, I didn't buy this from Walmart Scotland)
- A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas for $14 (with my long sought-after collectible Waffle-bot wind-up toy!)
- Canon MX892 wireless printer for $60 (Airprint finally!)
- Sony 32 gig SD card for $17 (I bought this for someone who for whatever crazy reason only uses Sony SD cards)
- Jackass 3.5 dvd from Best Buy for $2
- Social Network dvd from Best Buy for $2
- Shutter Island blu ray from Best Buy for $4
- Swiss Gear 19 inch upright luggage from Target for $65 (this one will be returned - I honestly cannot think of any good reason for me to need a small carry on luggage piece right now; I was just in a happy clicking mode when I bought this)
- Corelle Livingware Winter Frost dinner set from Target for $18 (I am returning this one as well, since I ended up liking the Garden Sketch Band pattern I got from Amazon so much)
- Titanic 3D blu ray from Amazon for $15 (for the 3D tv that I don't have)
- Boxwave USB-Lightning cable for $9 (half the price of Apple's original - good to have spare for my iPhone 5 at work)
- Sufjan Stevens Silver & Gold for $14 and Green Day's Dos albums for $5 on Amazon mp3
- Kill Bill Volume 2 for $6 (loooved volume one but not a big fan of volume 2 - needed to complete my collection)
- Sandra Lee pizza stone set from Sears for $10 (using my Sears cash card which has been sitting in my wallet for over a year)
- J. Crew Factory sweatshirt for $18
- J. Crew Factory wallet for $22
- Two Uniqlo Heat Tech undershirts, and two Uniqlo boxer briefs for $32 (again with the twos)
Not counting the two items from Target that I am returning, I think I spent around $380, about $150 of which I paid for with existing store credits like Amazon dollars I earned by using my credit card. So out of pocket, it's about $230.
To be honest, there is guilt involved even if it's Black Friday. This year has been pretty spend-heavy, especially with all my medical bills. I am still paying about $100 a pop every week seeing the herbalist/acupuncturist. So I am not exactly rolling in dough. I promise, this is it. No more frivolous spending for the rest of the year. I will just take a breather and enjoy all this stuff I got in the last few weeks. After all, even someone like me knows that more stuff doesn't mean more happiness; it just means more stuff so you can be distracted from your unhappiness.
On a recent interview on Live With Kelly and Michael (I haven't watched that show since Regis left), this is how Dolly responded to a rapid fire Q&A:
