Yaayy..Thanksgiving??

I hope everyone had a great holiday..mine, as usual was hectic.

Me, TOH and a gaggle of others (TOH's best friend, his friend's wife(of Cold Stone Nastery fame), their baby, his wife's sister, her two kids and their cousin) headed out to TOH's hometown on Thursday morning..great, a 3 car caravan..in the rain..oh, good times.

It was good to see the in-laws (they soil me and TOH is jealous..ha ha) but I can only stay in the country a couple of days before all that nature starts to get on my nerves..what the fuck could those crickets NEED at this time of night...are those gunshots..again??..WTF??

I knew that we would be doing the whole Black Friday thing again..and this year we had a four-person crew.
Why oh why do I subject myself to this every year you say?...$3.98 crock pots from Wal-Mart, that's why dammit!!
And if that wasn't bad enough, Lowes had bigger, prettier, name brandier ones for $9.99 for shit's sake..somehow we ended buying 5 of those..one of which is to be wrapped up and given to me and my friend's sister for Christmas..my friend wants us to feign surprise and glee when we open them on Christmas day..yes, we're weird like that.
Ok so the list went:
Wal Mart - Which was a surprisingly smooth shopping experience AND checkout was a fucking dream..who knew??
Lowes - Did I mention $9.99 Crock Pots??..oh yeah, I did
Target - Talk about cluster-fuck..we were in line FOREVER..actually we split up into two lines because we figured we had some sort of system..we're dumb though..I got a $6 top and some Carmex..what a waste.
Michael's - Woo Hoo..$5 collage frames, with a 20% coupon!!
Home Depot - My friend's cousin bought a pneumatic nailer and a table saw...looks dangerous but You Go Girl!!
Old Navy - Even though they're bastards for discontinuing the Plus Size stuff in the stores, I found some really cute cords in the Misses section that fit perfectly for $15 a pair..O had to buy them in 3 different colors..Spender's Anonymous here I come...but thank god, we missed the "morning rush" this time. Last year we stood in line for 45 minutes.
Various Stores In Some Rinky Dink Backwoods Mall - I was so delirious from sleep deprivation at this point, I'm not even sure if I bought anything..wait!!
Ashley Stewart - A lot of things in this store look like something out a black gospel church fashion show (feathers and zebra print and such) but I found a rack labeled $5.98..my heart started to beat hard..why am I sweating?? Because I found two "$40" dresses on that rack, that's why!!
Goodwill..two of them - My friend is all about the Goodwill store. I appreciate that they all smell good, unlike most thrift stores that smell like stale ass.
Staples - they can go straight to hell..I've been eyeballing a Panasonic phone system for a year now (our current piece of Motorola bullshit has gone all defective on us..the "on" and several other important buttons no longer function) and good god!! I saw that they had one listed for $50 in their sales flyer! *clutching the pearls* so I nag and complain the whole morning so that my friend will NOT miss this store and when I get there..they only have ONE left..so I take it up to the front to check out and the broad says "That comes to $98.60", uh..como se wha? Then she tries to hand me some "Easy Rebate" card bullshit..I had to catch myself from choking her and cursing loudly and said "what's this?".."Uh, that's how you get it for $50..and it may take 4-5 weeks"..let's just say I needed a "time out" in the car for a while after that...with no phone

Honorable Mentions:
Circuit City and Best Buy - (You've got to be kidding me right?..these hell pits are crowded on a REGULAR day, so we just drove by and pointed and laughed at the dummies camping out)
Linens-N-Things - sigh...I couldn't even afford the bedding when it was on sale for shit's sake..being poor is SO not cute.

I wanted to hit a couple of more stores but at that point, we had been in and out of an over-packed, over-crowded crossover SUV for more than 8 hours and everyone was tired, loopy and hungry. Then we got into a "discussion" about children and parental discipline..I'm sure I would have been better off starting a conversation about the joys of abortion with a pro-lifer.

I could feel a fist fight brewing..time to drive an hour back to my Mother-in-law's house in the backwoods of hell and nap..and eat..and nap again because being a tech support slave, I had to be back to work on Saturday morning..fuckers.

I drove the four hours back home BY MYSELF but not before visiting MIL at the store where she works and racking up on cute stuff..which she paid for "because your birthday is next month", she said (Did I mention that I just LOUURRVE my MIL??) ..TOH stayed behind to visit with his family and they've been mad at him all weekend for letting me go back alone..nanny nanny boo boo, they like ME more than you (sorry, I'm sleepy).

And wouldn't ya know that when I tried to call everyone to tell them that I made it home safely, the aforementioned piece of shit phone seems to have sensed that I was flirting with a new phone and decided to go completely bat shit..now the "2" and "5" buttons must be jammed until your finger breaks..at least I can call 911..oh wait, no I can't because the fucking "On" button won't allow you to!!!..great...happiness.