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11/27/2004 Entry: "Post Thanksgiving Tales" Well, the last 24 hours have also been interesting. 1. Thanksgiving went great. There was food, Sawa, and Brad. Then the Heares came over, and discussed how relatives drove them crazy. Chance stayed over for Black Friday. 2. Black Friday went well. In fact, it went TOO well, because it wasn't that crowded, and no one was rude, which made it a fair bit boring. I woke up a bit late, and we got to the mall 15 minutes later than I had planned. Then we bummed around real slowly. Probably too slow for Chance, in some cases. I wish I had some interesting juicy tidbit of human crassness to pass along, but apart from one guy with a funny hairdo and another guy with a slightly Hitler-esque mustache... nothing. Wait, that's not entirely true. Because of Chance's shopping needs, I ended up in two stores I previously never be caught dead in. The first was "Limited Too," a kid's offshoot of "Limited," a clothing chain. For popular, skinny model-type women. Limited Too is how I think Barbie (as in the doll, not the renowned SS interrogator and torturer) would design a store if her only direction were to, "Tone down the pink a tad." The second I walked in there with her (and before Chance gets mad, she was looking for a gift for her girly sister, and NOT anything for herself), I felt like I was on some foreign planet to which I was NOT welcome. Not that anyone even gave me the evil eye, no, but I felt entirely out of place and very uncomfortable. They had thongs. For kids. [shudders] EEUUGHHH!!! I mean, yes, I had heard about them, but there they were, complete with some picture of a lip-glossed pre-teen wearing stretch hip-huggers, with a purse tossed over her shoulder, looking back at the camera with a carefree look, as if to say, "I may be 11, but at least I don't have panty lines!" If I was Catholic, I would have crossed myself right then and there. Evil. Evil evil evil. For some reason I had to point this out to someone, so I mentioned it under my teeth to Chance and CR, and Chance nodded like, "Yah. That's disgusting." CR, who sadly didn't catch on as quickly, tried to build on my comment with a slightly too-loud, "And look, they have bras! What kid wears a bra??" Chance's face dropped to the floor. I said, "Uh... any girl who doesn't want her classmates to know how cold she is." Chance snickered. What a weird moment. Oh and the second place was a "Redskins NFL" store (local football team), but I am just not a sports fan, that's all. After the mall, we watched "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkiban." Then her parents came, stayed a bit, and then left. I went back to sleep. 3. At the mall, I cashed in 3 gift cards I had been holding onto for Borders/Waldenbooks. I so rarely get to one, and I get gift cards to the chain all the time. I bought two huge books, one was a treasury of National Lampoon photos and weird news clippings, and another was a Monty Python Autobiography by the Monty Python members themselves. I also got an Amazon.com certificate for my birthday, and so I got a copy of "The Annotated Alice," a strange work that's been out for a while, but I just found out about. It's the Alice in Wonderland books, with running sideline commentary about the history behind various passages, including political jibes, character inspirations, and other stuff about Dodgeson's life. The other book was, "Just a Geek," by blogger Wil Wheaton, who writes about some of the things that impacted his life. I also got 4 new shirts, 2 for work, 2 for play, from Land's End. 4. I can't go into this, but have you ever asked a friend, whom you have known for years, what was wrong, only to find a vein of hidden untapped anger that boils forth in a foam of disgust and despair? And you are left in shock going, "OMG... your life is like that? Holy God. Holy dear god!" Yeah. 5. Someone else, whom I like and have for... over a decade, called me their best friend. I was totally shocked by this, and sadly, the first though was how unworthy I was. Which went badly, because he assumed by pause and frustration was a rejection of some kind. This has been cleared (I hope), but when someone says that to me, I take that very seriously. Boy, is he gonna regret this! Tell them, Neal, what hell you have gone through! Tell him how I got you in trouble in sixth grade!