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Is it just me or are folks becoming nastier with each passing year?
I was eating a delicious turkey sandwich and watching the news when I picked up on a story about a confrontation in an electronics store on the day after Thanksgiving or what has become known as “Black Friday.” Apparently two women who had been waiting outside the store for hours in the freezing cold, in the dark of the early morning hours of Friday, were in the hunt for the same very popular item and after standing in line then shoving their way through the store, arrived at the display to find only one gadget remained. Well, as you can imagine, these two women were extremely grouchy by this time after having spent their entire morning at the end of a long line, freezing to death. My television screen showed a fuzzy camera phone video, of these two woman actually fighting over the item, pushing, shoving and hitting until the store manager finally had to break up the unhappy twosome. I don’t know which one of the woman ended up with the item or perhaps they were escorted out without either one obtaining their holiday gift. Nonetheless, it was disturbing and after the attractive newscasters went to another story and I had started on a piece of pumpkin pie, I began to contemplate what I had just witnessed and started thinking about the whole Black Friday madness.
I engaged in the Black Friday ritual only once, standing outside in ten degree weather for two hours, drinking coffee (and then discovering their was no place to go to the bathroom – I don’t recommend it) at 4:00 a.m., all this for a $20 coupon to the store inside. When I got a little older and became a little wiser I realized that my time was worth more than $10 an hour and now leave the insanity to others. I do agree that there are some fantastic deals out there on Black Friday, computers and other electronic goodies are 50% off to the first 15 people in line. But for the folks near the back of the line your prospects are slim to none to get one of the great deals and merely measly at getting one of the good ones. Toys and game systems are other hot items for Black Friday, sending droves of crazed parents to trample one another to secure their child’s Christmas dreams.
I may be a radical but I say, if you have to practically kill someone to get it, buy something else. I raised three children and have had thirty years of great Christmas’, all without becoming a felon. While it is true, my kids did not always get everything they wanted, most years they got a bestest, bestest gift, and sometimes it was something that didn’t even make their humongous lists. As adults, my kids remember all the great stuff they got at Christmas and not what might have been missing any particular year and show no permanent scaring from missing out on a popular gift or two. I am fairly confident they have not been damaged by any ghosts of Christmas’ past.
Nowadays I do most of my Christmas shopping on the Internet. I discovered that there are plenty of great deals on-line on Black Friday and you don’t even have to change out of your pj’s to get them. No pushing or shoving unless you count my husband and I fighting over the last piece of pumpkin roll to have with our morning coffee. Plus, there is always a bathroom nearby. Hallelujah!
It’s official now, the world has gone completely mad. I heard on the evening news that Santa Claus’ working in shopping malls this holiday season will no longer be allowed to say “ho, ho, ho” because it is degrading to women and frightening to children. What complete moron came to that conclusion on my behalf? I have been around a long, long time and I have to say, I have never been offended by the street corner and shopping center Santas’ saying “ho, ho, ho”. When did political correctness trump common sense? Can’t we take a vote of all women as to whether or not this is truly offensive to us? Who is it that is out there making these arbitrary decisions on behalf of woman and children everywhere? When did we stop having any say at all as to what we find offensive? There is a whole world of difference between Don Imus or some rapper say the slang word “ho” in an offensive, derogatory manner and a man dressed as a Christmas icon saying “ho, ho, ho” in a shopping mall and I believe that most woman and children are intelligent enough to know the difference. I’ll bet that it was a guy without any children who ultimately made the decision to ban the Santa’s normal repertoire with the ridiculous “ha, ha, ha” that has been proposed. It was obviously someone who has not spent a lot of time taking their children to a crowded mall to sit on Santa’s lap for if they did they would know that it is the noise, the crowd and the big red suit that frightens children, not the “ho, ho, ho”. Perhaps if you changed Santa’s suit to blue (the color invokes feelings of honesty and trust, ask any lawyer) or all white, the children that are frightened now would forever more embrace the miss-colored Santa and his “ho, ho, ho”. I want to know, will the “powers that be” also ban “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”, and “A Charlie Brown Christmas” as they all contain the now nefarious “ho, ho, ho” patented slogan? When were my fundaments rights to enjoy Christmas and the whole “Ho, Ho, Holiday Season” squashed by some ridiculous notion that recently popped into someone’s head? Where will it stop? Will it stop?
I think we should take a cue from Arlo Guthrie and start a movement but instead of singing a refrain of “Alice’s Restaurant” to government officials we should sing a chorus of “Up on the Roof Top” complete with a boisterous “ho, ho, ho” for good measure. I’ll lead the way.
I wanted to write something in a different vein this week so I thought I would share a fond memory. Many years ago when I worked with the District Attorney’s office, I came across an old file, complete with police report and photograph. It was the mug shot that initially caught my eye and sent me delving further into the old manila folder. The photo, complete with inmate number, showed a disheveled man with shoulder length hair and full beard. He looked like a reject from an old civil war movie but it was the man’s shirt that piqued my interest, together with the look upon his face. His worn t-shirt announced to the world that, without a doubt, “SH*T HAPPENS,” yet his expression was one of utter confusion as he stood there holding the little black sign with his name emblazed on the front. It was the combination of the two that set me off in gales of laughter within my tiny cubicle as I considered the picture. I wondered at the man’s surprise at his current predicament when he knew full well that “SH*T HAPPENS”, and should not be astonished at all that his final end came at the hands of the Sheriff’s Department. Perhaps it was the events that lead to the man’s arrest that bewildered him. The man had a long and varied criminal history, beginning with misdemeanor theft charges which the moved on up to more serious felony charges of Burglary and Larceny. Apparently, he was hoping to move into the field of Identity Theft, it was not called so back in those days, but you get the idea. The man stole a wallet and proceeded to attempt to pass himself off as the owner of the wallet. What the man did not know was, that the man whose identity he had begun to use was a wanted escaped felon from an adjacent state. It turned out that the would be “victim” had escaped while in transport from the local jail to the prison where he was to spend the rest of his life behind bars for a serious felony charge. As you can imagine, when the man started spreading his new name around it peeked the interest of the local law enforcement who then picked him on the outstanding felony escape warrant. Now, when he was arrested he had a driver’s license with his picture on it but the other man’s name and it was not until some time later that it was discovered through fingerprints and photographs that he was not the wanted felon. Unfortunately for him, although he was not the wanted criminal, he could be charged with Theft and Forgery, which is how he finally found himself a guest of the Sheriff’s Department. I am pleased to report that his indiscretion did help officials to finally capture the real escapee and return him to prison to serve his sentence with an additional 10 years for the escape charge slapped onto the end of his original sentence. I don’t know what happened to the man with the shirt in the photograph or perhaps I just don’t remember any longer. Perhaps it was karma that lead the man to his arrest with our Sheriff’s Department but I liked to think that it was because “SH*T HAPPENS.” Who knew?
