The I hate Shoppers post

[czarina]

I went shopping today-I am lucky I have all my limbs intact. I had people pushing and grabbing things from me, skipping in line like animals. BUT! Overall I did well with my shopping so I feel good about it.
I almost adopted a bird at Petsmart. He had a deformed leg and looked so sad and loney But I hate birds really and I reminded myself that we cannot adopt every animal that needs adopted. They wont put him to sleep-hopefully he will get a home before Christmas.

[ulij20]

This is one reason why I never start my shopping the day after Thanksgiving, because you'd be surprised at the volume of people who got the same idea as you.

Then, there are those jerkoffs that speed into the parking space that you're gearing up to pull into. One time someone did that to me and I grabbed the cup of (flat) root beer that I had in my cup holder and threw it onto the car. And, since it was about fifteen degrees out at the time, I can imagine what it did to their paint job. I sort of regret doing that but, at the same time, I probably made them decide never to try that again.

[Mega248]

What I hate is when large stores don't open most of their registers during the holiday season. It's annoying as hell to wait in line for fifteen minutes because only 2 out of 20+ registers are open.

[crash46]

Today was the first time in 3 years that I stayed home for the "door-busters" sale. They reported on the evening news that prices were being slashed even lower than a year ago, because last year's season wasn't too strong. Well they couldve' fooled me because I wasn't overwhelmed by anything that I didn't already have, otherwise I would have been out there. I work a part-time job that sends me out to work at 4 or 5 in the AM all the time, so getting up early to go wait in line is not a problem here. The best deals were all on things too expensive for me to buy.

And if the underwhelming deals weren't bad enough, you had both Best Buy and Circuit City advertising the Playstation 2 (not 3) for $150. That's the same price as it always is you dips***s! Don't waste ad space on things that aren't even on sale! They just want Grandma to look at the ads and see those and think they're on sale because she doesn't know any better. F***ing psychological marketing trickery.

And speaking of Circuit City, they didn't even have their "every CD for $10" deal this year. What's up with that. Yeah, really slashing those prices even lower than last year!

(sorry, I guess this was more of a "I hate retail stores post".)

[a Nick O!]

czarina said:

I almost adopted a bird at Petsmart. He had a deformed leg and looked so sad and loney

My girlfriend('s family) has a pet cockatiel, I believe it is, named Sonny Boy. He's a lot of fun. If, assuming she and I get married, we ever get a bird, I'll have to name it Avenger, after Harvey Birdman's secretary.

Otherwise, I went out on the 25th, but it was to specifically buy the Billie Joe Armstrong issue of Rolling Stone, since it didn't come in the mail and I had already received my Madonna ( ) issue. Also, I went and rebought the birthday card that my girlfriend never got last August, because her dad's ex-girlfriend is apparently an immature broad. (Long story.)

[crash46]

I drove past Best Buy on Thanksgiving evening at 6pm and there was already a sizable gathering outside the door, complete with tents and propane heaters. I've just been told some even arrived on Wednesday. I mean, I could understand wanting to make sure you get the best deals, but who forfeits their entire Thanksgiving just to save 70 dollars on a laptop (compared to other places where they wouldn't have to wait nearly as long). That's really the only hot item they had, in my opinion.

So I settled on Circuit City. getting there two hours before they opened, and got the TV I'd been looking for, for half off its regular price. In addition to the second season of The Office and a 2GB memory card for my camera. The crowd was surprisingly tame and friendly and we were all pulling for each other. The people around me had friends waiting in the Best Buy line who were calling with a different story; apparently the Deputy Sheriff actually had to earn his pay over there.

The worst part of my endeavors was trying to stay conscious while running on fumes, waiting in a motionless line while Circuit City and their DOS-based cash registers tried to handle its work load. But I think I made the right call this time around.

[mtm4319]

I'm reading the above post from this computer:


(Not the exact same tower, but you get the idea.)

3 GB of RAM, 320 GB hard drive, LightScribe disc burning technology... and of course, the 22" widescreen monitor. $599.99 plus tax after mail-in rebates.

I pulled an all-nighter (after sleeping from 6PM to 9PM Thanksgiving night) and waited about 2 1/2 hours in line at Office Depot. Apparently some people at my Best Buy were selling their item tickets.

[blahblahblah]

Pretty sweet deal, although it depends on what processor is in that tower.

My roommate's friend apparently went to Circuit City to buy that 42" LCD TV that was 50% off from $2400. They lined up at 5pm on Thanksgiving day and apparently there were already 30 people in line. Wow.

I had my first Black Friday experience today. Unlike my previous Boxing Day endeavours in Canada, I didn't bother to wake up early because I didn't really want any of the big ticket items. So I ended up going to Circuit City, Best Buy, and Target after 10am, and copped seasons one and two of The Office, seasons one and two of House and the third volume of Family Guy as well as a 4GB USB flash drive and a 320GB external hard drive. There were barely any lineups at Best Buy at the cashiers, which surprised me.

[crash46]

blahblahblah said:

My roommate's friend apparently went to Circuit City to buy that 42" LCD TV that was 50% off from $2400. They lined up at 5pm on Thanksgiving day and apparently there were already 30 people in line. Wow.

Might have been the same one I got, except that it was 50% off from $1600. I estimated, by the fact that only 150 people were allowed into the building at the same time, that I was about 200th in line, arriving at 3am.

A couple of guys that came about 5 minutes after I got there said that all they wanted was some skins for their Wii.

I later admitted if I wasn't gonna do Circuit City, it was gonna be Walgreens, so that I could save 25 cents on a Cadbury Egg.

[mtm4319]

blahblahblah said:

Pretty sweet deal, although it depends on what processor is in that tower.

Click the pic I posted above for the specs...

Processor is Athlon 64 X2 (B) 4800+ 2.5 GHz (65W).

[Pipa]

mtm4319 said:

I'm reading the above post from this computer:

<snip>
(Not the exact same tower, but you get the idea.)

3 GB of RAM, 320 GB hard drive, LightScribe disc burning technology... and of course, the 22" widescreen monitor. $599.99 plus tax after mail-in rebates.

I pulled an all-nighter (after sleeping from 6PM to 9PM Thanksgiving night) and waited about 2 1/2 hours in line at Office Depot. Apparently some people at my Best Buy were selling their item tickets.

3GBs of RAM? 320GBs?!? What are you doing, calculating pi?

But seriously though, that's a great deal considering there are laptops about the fraction of that selling for about the same price.

[golden eagle!]

I did just a little bit of shopping yesterday. I went to Target with my mom and grandma. I only shopped for some things I needed.

A Best Buy store here had shoppers camping out the night before. Also, Kohl's department stores were open at 4am. That's insane.

[crash46]

OK, Thanksgiving's over, and so is the Thanksgiving spirit. It is now Black Friday spirit. F*** all retailers who sell computer monitors. Not one deal on a monitor larger than 19" (and only ONE even gave a deal on the 19", and being Best Buy, you'd have to give it to me free to try to forge that line, let alone a couple of the employees that I'd find inside (story for another day, maybe. .)

F*** Macy's too for their "$10 off purchases of $25 or more" coupon, with fine-print exclusions of about every brand they have. It'd probably been easier to just list the brands that are included. I didn't even open the ad after that. Way to waste three trees, assholes.

Given the economic situation, I expected somebody, at least, to step up and nonetheless demand a shopping visit today through some advertised deals. Everybody's got a GPS. I bet even f***ing Family Dollar will have a GPS if I went there. Too bad I know where everything is and have no use for a GPS aside from the entertainment provided by the voice-bot trying to pronounce the name of places such as my city (toe-led-AH).

Didn't see much of a reason to go anywhere. I guess I'll go to Kohl's for the quesadilla maker of my dreams, OfficeMax for an executive vice president's chair, and maybe Target for some DVD's, because Target has failed to piss me off yet in my lifetime. No need to wait in line for any of them, at least.

[a Nick O!]

Nov 28, 2008 4:08:15 GMT -4 crash46 said:

Way to waste three trees, assholes.

This made me laugh.

I can't afford s*** right now, so I bought nothing today.

[crash46]

No shopping today. Underwhelmed again this year. They continue to try and shove GPS units down everyone's throat. What if we know where everything is already? Everyone's phone will have one built into it within the next two years anyway.

Looks like there were some really good deals on TV's, at least. Don't need one of those now, though.

I was hoping for a deal on PC's but we're not 'supposed' to buy PC's anymore; we're 'supposed' to buy laptops and smart phones . So the only PC deals really were discount economy PC's with last year's processors that come with a monitor that I don't need and I don't benefit financially by leaving the monitor out. So that's letdown #1.

Was supposed to help a friend search for the best deal on an Xbox 360 with that Kinect. If I liked anything I saw, I'd probably get one too. But not a single retailer could give jack s*** in terms of add-on's for buying the Kinect unit at full price? Alright then, you don't deserve my money.

[blahblahblah]

I ended up jumping in on the Black Friday deals too despite being north of the border.

Amazon.ca advertised that they were going to have a Black Friday sale for Canadians, as many Canadian retailers are advertising it in order to compete with going south to shop. But their sales were totally pathetic despite free shipping. In fact, it didn't feel like a sale at all. I went for Amazon.com instead and even including shipping fees and import taxes, it was still cheaper to buy stuff from there. I grabbed myself 8 Blu-ray discs for $9 or less each, as I recently bought myself a cheap discounted player.

Arguably, my favourite clothing retailer, Express was having a 40% off everything sale in addition to a $25 off $75 coupon code on their website, of which the latter expired at noon. Which was too bad, because their servers were crashing and crawling before the deal ended! What good is that for?! Seeing that 40% off everything was still a good deal, I picked out a few clothing items, adding up to around $220. When I got to checkout, I saw that shipping to Canada was $16. Whatever. And then I saw that there was an "International Processing Fee" of $75. f***. That. s***. So I just gave up on that, because I calculated that after all the fees, in total I would only save $16 over regular price, and I rarely ever buy anything from there at regular price anyway. I wish we they would branch out to Canada already. :madface:

[radical347]

Nov 27, 2010 13:45:38 GMT -4 blahblahblah said:

And then I saw that there was an "International Processing Fee" of $75. f***. That. s***. So I just gave up on that, because I calculated that after all the fees, in total I would only save $16 over regular price, and I rarely ever buy anything from there at regular price anyway. I wish we they would branch out to Canada already. :madface:

Holy $hit. $75?!?!? That's ridiculous!!!

I bought a few things this weekend:
Amazon's Lightning Sales: The Arcade Fire's (Friday, 5-9 AM PST) and LCD Soundsystem's (Saturday, 5-9 PM PST) latest for $5.99 apiece. They have a few others going on 'til Monday.
Amazon and FAO: A bunch of Ugly Dolls. And, for spending $75 worth of toys at Amazon ( ) I got a free Amazon-branded Gund Bear! (The hat says "amazon.com". How cool is that!)
Target: A weak sweater 'coz I needed a nightshirt for $4.88 and comforter for $18. It's getting cold!
Borders: Well, technically I didn't buy this, I got a latte since they sent me a coupon for a free one. Couldn't complain about that.
Streetlight Records (the closest thing to Tower these days, IMO): 25% off all used CDs. I got Channel 104.9's :-\ Stripped Down/Live vol. 1. (From 2003, before they moved down to 92.3, but I didn't even realize they had live CDs!) Mostly because it has a live version of "Dirty Sticky Floors" by Dave Gahan, but a few other tracks you don't see too often on CDs like these such as "The Saddest Song" by The Ataris and "Think Twice" by Eve 6. The latter, which I might add, was a fairly heavy recurrent up until mid-2010 (at which point it got replaced by "Inside Out." ) They also had a vol. 2 which I didn't get it since it was nowhere near as exciting.

Places where I didn't buy things: (All at the mall, where I went mainly to look anyway)
Gap: Was crap.
Express: They had 40% off everything here too, except I don't really buy things for 40% off of list price at these types of places, I wait until they're on clearance for at least that first and then, on top of that do something like "an additional 40% off of clearance." That and the line zig-zagged and filled up the entire store.
Guess: See above, except list price things were 20% off (oh yeah, because $120 is so much better than $150 for a pair of jeans ) but clearance things were an add'l 50% off which made things slightly more reasonable. I still prefer their "G by Guess" stores to just plain "Guess" but that was at the outlet mall and I didn't feel like going over there too since there was nothing else there of interest. For some reason the entire store seemed to be filled with Asian exchange students. The line was equally as long as at Express too, though there was more space here.
Levi's: Everything here that looked cool wasn't on sale and everything on sale wasn't cool. I was thinking about getting a big thick ugly tacky sweater to use as a nightshirt, but that on sale on top of clearance was $25 which is too much for something like that (and ended up getting the subpar, but much better valued one at Target.)
Marc Ecko Cut & Sew: What a ridiculous name, but this is supposed to be the slightly less tacky version of one of my favorite brands, Ecko. Everything was buy one get one 50% off, which translates into <25% off (25% only if both things are the same price), making it not that Black Friday-worthy of a deal either. The stuff actually did look pretty cool, but after trying them on -- terrible quality!!! The only thing that I thought might be worthwhile was a track jacket for $40. Which, if I found another $40 item, would make both of them $30 which still wouldn't be worth it IMO. I'll just wait until it goes on sale even more by itself, since it probably will.

(About to crosspost most of this to my LJ, just to warn those who are about to read twice!)

[Pipa]

Well I'm Picpak and I'm hear to say,
I didn't buy anything on Black Friday.

Sorry, just felt that needed to be rapped.

[radical347]

Like last year we went to Oakridge Mall at midnight when most stores opened and it was awesome. No lines in the parking lots, short or no lines in most stores, no pushing or shoving, nobody looking in that much of a hurry to get anywhere (since most of the stores had sales until noon or later) and it wasn't really even busier than on a normal weekend night. It was probably the closest thing to the 24 hour shopping malls in Asia that we'll see over here.

From Target we picked up the Foster the People & Imagine Dragons CDs for $5 apiece and couple of $10 Blu-Rays. A few more things from G, Express (which did have a line, but they had a pair of jeans I liked, and 50% off, which made it $35 is as cheap as it's going to get from there and not a terrible deal for a decent pair of jeans), and the Disney Store. Hot Topic had all tees for $10 on Friday but pretty much all of the men's tees were garbage, sadly.

We also bought a bunch of stuff from KidRobot Online...two hoodies, two sweaters, a t-shirt and a vinyl tofu toy for under $100 shipping. Considering that's close to the list price for just one of those items from there, major score.

[crash46]

I didn't go anywhere last Friday. I'm always open to going out early for the right price, but nothing I wanted stood out. The world's trying to shove a tablet down my throat and I just don't care yet. Just like I didn't care two years ago when they tried to shove GPS units down my throat and now every phone has GPS (other than mine, and I still don't care), and I still have my money.

So, I just got a bunch of memory cards. And the Punch Out game for Wii, because it was $10. And because it was Punch Out. Never left the house, either.

[blahblahblah]

Ever since moving to New York, I hate shopping on weekends, let alone Black Friday! Not to mention, I actually had to work that day. I wish I had known KidRobot had an online sale, or else I would have jumped on it. I ended up shopping online only, and I bought Dance Central 3 for Xbox 360 Kinect $15 from the Microsoft Store, a Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker for $20 (because, why not?) and from Amazon.com, CDs from Frank Ocean and Alex Clare for $5 each, a USB thumb drive and a bunch of < $10 Blu-rays.