Last Minute Shopping

by Brendan Smith
Weirs Times Editor

I won’t be shopping on Black Friday again this year.
It doesn’t make much sense to me to stay up late on Thanksgiving night, after ingesting a significant amount of tryptophan, and then fight crowds of others similarly affected, just to get a few good deals.
Still, the inevitability of having to buy Christmas presents will be forced upon me eventually and I will once again partake of that other famous Christmas present shopping day – Bleak Monday Evening.
On some years, this might be called Bleak Tuesday Evening or Bleak Wednesday Evening. It changes every year.
It is designated by the night before Christmas Eve when I, as well as so many of my fellow brethren, will find myself forced to shop for Christmas gifts a mere twenty-four hours before that five o’clock Christmas Eve whistle blows. When the stores close early for Christmas Day and we are left with whatever goods we could scrape up from the bare shelves to show our loved ones how much we care.
There are some, legend has it, who will even wait past Bleak Monday Evening and, instead, venture out on Very Bleak Tuesday Evening, otherwise known as Christmas Eve, to start their shopping. Some Very Bleak Evening legends starting as late as 4pm, gathering up as many goods as possible while store employees sweep up and start turning off lights.
To them I tip my hat in awe and hope that I never have to go through such an experience.
I sit here and write about this inevitability weeks ahead and, even though I make a conscious effort to remind myself that I can avoid it all together if I just get up out of my chair and get my shopping done early, I still, like so many others -and you know who you are – will wake up on Bleak Monday Morning and realize that, yes, time has run out once again.
It’s just the way I roll.
I have, in past years, tried to force myself to get some Christmas shopping done earlier, but I have found it a fruitless endeavor. Knowing that I have all the time in the world, my attention is easily diverted.
Starting in the women’s sweater department, I often become woozy and close to blacking out. Once I regain my balance, I find myself in front of the latest 85-inch, 4K televisions.
I am told there is a new drug that can help with these symptoms, but the side effects include the possibility of a lifelong fear of electronics. Something I don’t think I could afford to live with.
This kind of reaction does not happen on Bleak Monday Evening since my time and focus are very limited. Even though the glare and excellent sound of the 85-inch 4K TV beckons me from afar, my sense of responsibility, along with the thought of what Christmas morning would look like if I fail in the endeavor, keep me on the straight path of finding heartfelt Christmas gifts as quickly as possible.
I have had nightmares of failing, and on Christmas Day being banished to the children’s table, even when there are no children present, eating dinner, cramped and uncomfortable.
Last year I tried to do some shopping early using the Internet, figuring that would be a safe, less distracting route. Still I, like so many others, was easily distracted by a YouTube video of a dog and a cat seemingly lip-syncing to “We Wish You A Merry Christmas”.
My mind quickly drifted to what this would look and sound like on a 85-inch, 4K television.
After a few dozen viewings (how did they get that darn cat to move his lips so perfectly) I had found that I had, as usual, run out of time and needed to do other things, like hydrate myself.
Seeing I would get no shopping done this way, I decided to post the video on my Facebook page. If I wasn’t going to accomplish any online shopping, then I was going to make sure none of my so-called “friends” would either.
To avoid any of this in the first place, I once considered making homemade Christmas gifts. After all wasn’t this the idea of some of those early Christmases? To spend time carefully constructing unique gifts with your own hands and then presenting them to loved ones and watching their expression as they unwrap them. They would be keepsakes that would last a lifetime and not just shallow commercial gifts that probably wouldn’t even be around next Christmas.
But that thought never lasts more than a couple of seconds.
Thank goodness. Who really has time for that?
So, Bleak Monday seems like it will be the only alternative for me again this year. There is no time for fooling around and I can get myself in that zone and focus without the thought of distraction.
It may not be the best way to shop for those I love and care about, but it’s better than nothing.

An audio version of this and other columns can be heard at BrendanTSmith,com. Brendan is the author of “The Flatlander Chronicles” and “Best Of A F.O.O.L. In New Hampshire” His latest book “I Only Did It For The Socks & Other Tales Of Aging” will be published in early 2020.