Let the Cattle Call Commence

I was at the dentist this week when one of the assistants asked me about my plans for Thanksgiving. “Eating,” I said, already imaging the feast that I’d missed over the past 10 years while living overseas. Having divorced parents gives me two such spreads, and I was picturing the delectable meals when the girl said, “What about Black Friday?”

Suddenly visions of turkey and gravy morphed into 300 pound Walmart shoppers jockeying for position at the “starting line” at 4 am, a whistle blowing and a stampede beginning, a string of trampled casualties left underfoot (or underhoof).

“Who the hell would go shopping on Black Friday?” I asked, wrinkling my nose in disgust. “Like, who is so desperate that they have to wake up at 4 am, stand online with a bunch of loooosas and risk their life for a 20% discount at Toys "R" Us? I can’t think of anything I’d like to do less! Who does that? Seriously, who?”

“Um, I do,” the girl said, swiftly walking away. Crap. I felt like I'd just over complained to my waiter and was about to get my food spit on, in this case, my retainer tampered with to ruin my $4,000 smile.

“Oh, I guess it can be fun though!” I said, halfheartedly attempting to rectify the situation as she ignored me.

But seriously folks! Who does do that? Why do we let marketing and advertising and consumerism take over and convert us from human beings into savage beasts who will KILL other human beings just to get a few dollars off of shit we don’t need anyway? Do we really want to be part of that machine?

The answer is simple. Yes. We do. Cause we are all losas. But instead of buying a cattle prod and taking your chances out there, why not do what we do for every other aspect of our social lives nowadays? Do it virtually. We farm online, we chat online, we date online, we publish our every fartin move online – so this year, I will just Christmas shop online. Screw the masses.