Let the games begin

There are only two more days until Thanksgiving, which means you had better get into gear and start your preparations, if you haven't already. I'm talking here about strategizing for Black Friday.


More and more, Black Friday requires sophisticated survival and attack tactics. With stores opening earlier and earlier -- some even on Thanksgiving itself, resulting in Black Friday being usurped by Black Thursday -- you can no longer afford to lounge leisurely about after the meal is over. Doing so will cause you to miss incredible sales, and your holiday season will be off to a miserable start.


And forget about a post-Thanksgiving nap. If you do insist upon it, you will have to move dinner back accordingly, say to around 9 a.m. If you are the host of Thanksgiving, you should avoid serving leftovers later in the day, and make sure you hide any second helpings of dessert, as the promise of additional food will only encourage people to stick around when you need them to clear out. You need a cool head, and a quiet house, to ready yourself. 


A second vital tactic for Black Friday shopping is assembling your store coupons. This is no easy task, as coupons are increasingly complex, requiring legal assistance for interpretation. Some have time restrictions on them, such as "Valid only from 2:00:01 a.m. to 2:01:36 a.m., in countries whose names contain three consecutive Qs."


Others restrict the type of item you can use the coupon for, with so many restrictions that the only thing the coupon is actually good for is a piece of carpet lint (stains not included).


Some additional coupons you may encounter:


Extra 15% off all sale items only. All sale prices expire at 6 a.m. Friday. This coupon good only after 6:01 a.m. Friday.


30% off entire line of children's clothes. Expires at 10 a.m. Friday, or when child's attention span for shopping expires, whichever comes first.


55% off any item approved for sale, except those which are actually for sale.


Coupon good for entire day of shopping. Not valid on today's date or any future date.


35% off one-time purchase of $1,000 or more (metric).


Extra 99% off all items, except those covered by, or excluded by, any other coupon.


$50 off purchase greater than the square of the sum of the ages of all your aunts (by blood).

20% off all store items, except those heretofore on sale, whereupon the value of this coupon is reduced therewith to 10%, notwithstanding any prior such advertisements undertaken by this store or any other, in accordance with current local retail or exotic animal handling guidelines.

In the face of all these obstacles, I have developed my own survival tactic: I carefully gather my coupons, approach a harried-looking salesperson, smile politely, and throw all my coupons at her while pleading, "Is there anything I can use here?"


And if this fails,  I happily head back home to take a nap.