Have you made a purchase today (Black Friday)?

I m housebound. I heard from my daughter a bit ago. She bought Harry Potter pajamas.

My sister has a TCL TV with the built in Roku. It is a older version and I find it sluggish. She only uses it for Plex and Netflix. But Amazon has the Roku Ultra for 50% off so I bought one of those for her. Hopefully I can just install it and she won’t even notice anything changed except it is faster.

And it was just a random purchase. Hadn’t planned on it until I saw the sale. But it ended up being 48 bucks and is normally 100. I’m just going to call it a c-mas present.

No. Although I need to get a couple things from the grocery store for the weekend. So I’ll be heading that way shortly.

I intend to avoid ALL malls and big box stores.

No, I haven’t.

Nope. I celebrate Buy Nothing Day instead.

Nope. #OptOutside. Give yourself the gift of getting outside in nature. Feel the weather on your face. There is no better or longer lasting gift available today than the sky today.

I’m at work. I will go to Costco this evening for my regular weekly purchases, and I have already decided to add a few of the specially priced grocery items they have on sale this weekend only. They’ve got macadamia nuts at some ridiculously low price. There’s a few other things I’ll get while they’re on special. I don’t need any new electronics, so I won’t be making any big purchases. I was grateful to get an email with a special price for gift subscriptions to a magazine I really like and will be gifting a subscription to my best friend.

I might head out to the mall this evening. There’s nothing in particular I’m looking for, but in the past I’ve found some good deals on clothing on this day. By the evening it’s usually not as crowded too (also this is an upscale mall, so there probably won’t be any trampling, but can’t guarantee it).

Does anyone else hate the word “doorbuster”, by the way?

Buy nothing day means shit if you just buy twice as much tomorrow. You might as well stock up while the shit is cheap and use the savings for a bicycle. Maybe don’t drive as much.

@Demosthenes I don’t know the word “doorbuster” but I saw some pictures today; now I think I know where it comes from, or what it describes.
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I bought an electronic thing when a sale started yesterday. It’s a little complex to really measure the savings since there are different sorts of deals, versions, etc. Shopping online yesterday had me find a more appropriate model on sale than I had found before. Saving somewhere between $60 and $265 depending on how I think about it.

I purchased a dress off Amazon this afternoon. It was NOT a planned purchase, but an impulse buy that I just couldn’t let pass by!!! This time of year, I let the Flu determine IF I go shopping at any of our local stores. Well, we’ve had 3 people die from the Flu over the last week & I’ve decided to stay safe & stay close to home!!! I automatically do this ever year until people STOP sharing their bugs & then I go back to my normal lifestyle!!!

@johnpowell “Buy nothing day means shit if you just buy twice as much tomorrow.”

But I won’t buy twice as much tomorrow. In fact, I probably won’t buy anything tomorrow either. The point is that Black Friday encourages overconsumption, and it promotes a materialist conception of the good life (along with the bad behavior that typically accompanies it). I have no doubt that the sales are beneficial for some people. Then again, I’m not telling anyone else to observe Buy Nothing Day. All I said is that I do.

I just remember a purchase I have deliberately been delaying for the Black Friday sales. I need a new fitted sheet for my bed. I don’t need the flat sheet. I went to the store to see them some weeks ago, and they were much more expensive than I’d planned. I decided to wait to see if they go on sale. There are many options, and I’m sure one of them will be on sale. I’ll get something for sure.

No. Heading over to my sons house to build a ginger bread house with the kids.

However, what I AM doing is watching my Amazon Prime cart. I loaded it up to $198 as of Wednesday, and I’ve just been watching it curiously. It dropped to $170 on Thanksgiving Day. Today it went up by $8.00. It’s kind of like watching the stock market.
I’m going to sit on this until Cyber Monday. If it goes below 170….BUY BUY BUY!!!!

It’s interesting. Do you suppose it’s actually a reflection OF the stock market? I mean, could I put one item in there and watch the price fluctuate, and would it reflect the stock market?

A friend on FB said Bed, Bath and Beyond went off sale today, which is kind of weird.

@SavoirFaire… I just honestly believe that your net consumption in a month will be the exact same as it would have been without buy nothing day. Tomorrow is pedantic. You know what I mean. You are going to buy it in a few weeks so you might as well buy it now and take some cash out of Bezoses pocket.

I wasn’t planning to go shopping today.

We were done with Thanksgiving dinner early last night (Thanksgiving) and on the way home, I asked my daughter if she wanted to go shopping and she said no. I would have if she wanted to, and I was ok with not going, too.

I am going to dinner with a friend later and she likes to shop so we may end up in Costco or Kohl’s or something. I don’t need anything for myself, in fact I’m trying to get rid of shit, but I do need to go Christmas shopping. However, I don’t have a list and hate to just go into a store without a thought and then end up tempted to buy crap for myself.

My boss has a side job at Kohl’s and she texted last night (Thanksgiving) that it was crazy at 9 pm.

I hate Black Friday. It brings out the worst in greed.

@johnpowell Again, I’m not going to buy it in a few weeks. If my net consumption will be the same, it’s only because I have altogether stopped buying the kinds of things that people tend to buy on Black Friday. In any case, human psychology is a complex thing. We are creatures of habit, symbolism, and ritual. Participating in something mindlessly or deliberately abstaining from it can affect a person’s attitude beyond the moment. Those aren’t the only options, of course, but the point remains that we are what we repeatedly do.

^^^ Exactly. Not everyone is short of will power.

So you were going to not buy stuff you were not going to buy and call it a movement.

It is like me saying I won’t drive to the store today and it is special because I don’t have a car. It just was the natural flow.

Good on you for not buying as much. I buy very little too.

No, leave that to the rambling peasants :D

20 years ago Black Friday sales were just that…THE biggest sale of the holiday shopping season. Now you can pretty much get these deals any day of the year and not really worth all that insanity. Instead I got to stay home and play with my sons cats.

It’s not accurate that you can get the same deals every day of the year, @Vignette.

I’m not into it because I really don’t need anything, but I know that last year, there were specific things I wanted and I missed Black Friday, and I thought “those prices will come again during the Christmas season” and those prices did not come again.

I haven’t even thought about today being a big shopping day. I’ll wait until next week when the prices go back down. ;)

I went today. My daughter and my stepdad both needed new computers. I went to Costco and it was empty. I probably saved 300 bucks.

I didn’t buy anything today. Except gas. I only put $5 in my car, because the price is up for the holiday.

I am planning to buy new zumba shoes for myself. I’m hoping to get through the holidays without having to buy a gift. We’ll see. I guess I’ll have to buy some little things if I get invited to a party or something.

We got a laptop for half price, and a good deal on a set of Pyrex storage dishes.
Oh, and a pre-lit artificial Christmas for half price. My old one died last year (the lights refused to come on.

@johnpowell So you’re unsatisfied if I’m going to buy stuff the next day, and you’re unsatisfied if I’m not going to buy stuff the next day. There really is no pleasing some people.

Honestly, your response makes no sense. Leaving aside the fact that I never called Buy Nothing Day “special” or a “movement,” my personal behavior cannot determine whether or not it is either of those things. I observe Buy Nothing Day because it is an opportunity to practice mindfulness, and it is particularly good opportunity due to all of the social and cultural momentum in the other direction. That’s valuable in and of itself, regardless of one’s purchasing habits.

I just heard an add touting how their Black Friday sale goes through Sunday, the very next commercial was for Cyber Monday. Happy shopping!

Exactly. The sales go on all through the month and even into the new year. Last year, in January, we got a 52” flat screen TV for about $150 at Best Buy. I got a new lap top for about $100.