I don't know about you, but I am so not ready to be back in Providence.  Not that my hometown in Pennsylvania is any better.  And at least there's none of that fluffy white shit that shall not be named.  My drive back to Providence was said, by MapQuest and other sources, to take 9 hours and some change; however, with bumper-to-bumper traffic for miles before the Tappan Zee Bridge, just outside of New York City, it was 12 hours after my journey began that I rolled up to Providence.  Luckily, my boyfriend had loaned me his I-pod so I was not too bored with my journey.  The only thing that was really a downer is that every rest stop featuring Starbucks coffee, which I hate, and I didn't get a decent cup of coffee until I woke up after passing out after the drive.  

I'll tell you one thing though:  I did not go shopping on Black Friday, and I'm proud of that fact.  In fact, as a general principle, I do not go shopping at all in December, if I can avoid it.  Sure, groceries are a often necessary evil and I will probably cave and do some thrift store shopping before Christmas presents are needed, but the mall?  Fuggedaboutit!

Does the fact that Black Friday saw some pretty gruesome retail casualties freak out anyone other than me?  I mean, have you ever needed to shop so badly that you trambled the freaking employee at the front door of the store?  Why in the world would anyone ever want to shop at the same time as thousands of maddened shoppers with glazed eyes and fat pocketbooks?  Crazy.

I did a stint as a retail worker during a Christmas season.  I was, as I like to think of myself and as I named the comic book character I created during the season, "Bad Little Bookseller."  I hated my job.  Worse than hated it.  I despised myself for working retail, for taking a crappy mall job, but I needed the cash and the hours were flexible.  During the holidays I had to leave my house an hour before work, just to make the 10 minute drive and find a place to park.  In August, fifteen minutes was plenty early enough to leave for work and have a cup of Joe before punching in to boot, but starting the day after Thanksgiving, when I was forty five minutes late because I couldn't find a place to park... at the mall, my free-time was sucked up into sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic, cursing, and being pissed off all day at work.  It was not fun, so in homage to all those retail workers who have to deal with the fact that Christmas shopper are the most evil beings in the universe, I don't shop in December.  You're welcome.