Hangover

I blinked my eyes and opened them the merest slit, peering into the total darkness.  Good, I thought, it isn't morning yet.  I can go back to sleep.  But then the phone rang and there was an unusual amount of noise and voices coming from upstairs for the middle of the night.  And I really didn't remember ever getting ready for bed.  Realization then came--it wasn't the middle of the night, it was the middle of the evening, and I had fallen asleep.  Fall asleep, that is, for five whole hours.  And as I checked the time and saw that I had slept through the afternoon and evening and that it was now 9:00 at night, I had only one thought in mind: Curse that Black Friday.

It's true.  Even after all our complaints against the day, and our swearing last year to never again participate, we once again were caught in the current of commercialism, and we once again shopped to the death on Black Friday. 

We left the house at approximately 11:00 Thanksgiving evening, returned home at 2:40 the next morning, and were out again before 6:00.  We shopped the night and into the morning away.  We stood in check-out lines near to hours, we were pushed and shoved, we shared stories and tales of battle wounds from wars in years past, and we survived.

Looking back at the purchases our fury and extreme tiredness bought, it probably wasn't worth the blood, sweat, and tears (literally), and somethings may be going back, but the experience was exhilarating. 

Exhilarating, that is, until you crash at 4:00 that afternoon.