A Window, A Light...

I'm going into this weekend totally fried. It seems like my penchant for bizarre, if compelling and fairly nightmarish dreams has made a resurgence, as well as people in my living room until past 4 AM, and phone calls at 6 from people I don't know and have never met. 

Other then that, life's fine. I realize that I've got a couple of projects on various temperature burners right now, and even when I'm done with those, I rarely make them available to others which is kind of a shit resolution, if you ask me. I've been thinking of a good way to fix that, and I think I've got a solution, so I guess I'll keep you posted if that's the kind of thing you're interested in.

Caveat.  I like Thanksgiving. You hang out, you eat and drink. That's a good holiday. If you've got some extra time, you can even reflect on your situation and what you're thankful for. So, all in all, not a bad deal.

I feel a little differently about Black Friday. Now, I'm going to be gaming on Friday. The day itself is a perfectly fine one, and I will spend it drinking coffee or soda and storytelling Exalted. On the other hand, as being perhaps the single top shopping day in the year, I do not like the spectacle at all. You may, perhaps, blame this on me working retail and not being a big fan of consumerism in the first place. You don't sound surprised to hear that! Imagine that.

If you really want to eat Thanksgiving dinner early and camp out immediately after at the biggest big-box store you can find to save money on a laptop you may or may not get, be my guest, because there was no way for me to stop you when I worked at Circuit City and if possible, there's even less of a way for me to stop you now. The time one spends in line is equal, in some ways, to actually working ie. you are spending time, but money is just time you are compensated for. In this way, you can imagine that wherever you are waiting, you are being compensated by the store in the form of the amount you save on the amassed product you aquire. Early on in the day, stores hemmorage money only to recover it later on the day when non-sale items or non-redline products are purchased.

Little of this matters to the people who actually get the 300 dollar laptop. I just know it's not going to be me, because I'm going to enjoy my Thanksgiving, sleep in on Friday, and play games all day when I get up. I'd rather do that then have an Ipod, but I guess that's why I don't have a lot of stuff. Not that it matters though, because I'm actually pleased with how I spend my time these days. If I wanted it bad enough, I'd just order it to be delivered online.

Black Friday consumerism annoys me, because it makes workers lives hard (many have to work rediculous holiday hours for no additional compensation) and people are rude or antagonisitc to them when they don't get the stuff they feel entitled over (re: cheap product - this stuff goes remarkably fast). It's indicative of a holiday season that becomes a war zone in order to get crap you don't need, but whatever. I can enjoy my holidays by ignoring that and concentrating on things I like.

William Gibson stopped blogging while he was writing and as far as I know, just incorporated everything he wanted to get out into his pop-culture heavy books. While I should probably take his cue, I'm just going to lay a few interesting things I've found out there tonight. With any luck, I won't feel as obligated to write tomorrow morning, and I'll continue to work on the novel.

First, my friend Matt shared something pretty interesting with me today.
http://www.portfolio.com/news-markets/national-news/portfolio/2008/11/11/The-End-of-Wall-Streets-Boom/?refer=email&print=true
You're probably not surprised to discover that much of the loan business is based off what are basically just lies. That link is long, but it's not that long, so if you're interested in the rate crises that's a'brewin', then read up.

Second, I found this linked off a discussion of another interesting phenom, but here's an article on Japan's new convenience stores:
http://www.impactlab.com/2008/11/08/japan-re-invents-the-convenience-store/
I'm simultantiously reminded of Gibson's Lucky Dragon (which provides basically what you need, where you need it). I'm wondering how long it'll be until the 'general store' ethos kind of hits back, and a conveyor belt of tiny stores are created to facilitate needs. My guess is the more gas prices go up, the more likely it becomes as areas end up restructured to a neighborhood level over a period of time. Gas prices are dropping a lot now, but it's really only a matter of time before they go up again.

Likewise, does anyone know why prices have dropped so much? Is it linked to the economy?