She: A new era of shopping arrived this holiday season.
Z: Are you finally going all-Internet?
She: No way. But instead of my mom, my sister and I braving the Black Friday sales, grandma stayed home and the nieces came instead.
Z: How was that? You looked pretty tired when you got home.
She: I was exhausted. I had never seen anything like it. First of all, I ran into everyone I know who has a teenage daughter.
Z: Where?
She: These stores I didn’t know existed. They had alien names like Pink Flamingo Sparkle Mania, and Green Lean Girl Power machine.
Z: Sounds like U-6 girls soccer teams.
She: They weren’t that dissimilar. Unlike Koss, who I can barely drag to the grocery store to pick out snacks, these girls were oohing and ahhing over everything from cute pairs of socks to snazzy little earmuffs. It was amazing.
Z: Gee. Soooo sad to have missed it.
She: How do you like my rainbow peace sign earrings?
Z: Seriously?
She: The oohing and ahhing is contagious and it was pretty cute how much the girls enjoyed shopping. They were totally into it. Even when their mom was trying on stuff, they wanted to help.
Z: Did she bribe them?
She: No. They just live up to the stereotype. They were smiling and giggling and saying, “Dad would love you in these pink cupcake pajamas” and “Daddy would go nuts over this long sweater.”
Z: That’s exactly like when I say, “Can we go now?”
She: They even patiently tried on different sized sweatshirts so I could see which ones would fit Koss.
Z: Koss would probably pay them to do that the rest of his life.
She: If shopping is genetic then these girls are set. They are hard core.
Z: I don’t want to shock you, but it’s Koss and I who might be the real hard-core shoppers.
She: Excuse me?
Z: Black Friday had to change its name to Pasty Gray Friday after we were done with it.
She: Am I on Bizarro Earth?
Z: You don’t think Koss and I are capable of extreme shopping?
She: If we get within 100 feet of a Costco, Koss starts sobbing. He had to try on a pair of pants once, and it took four body builders, a lion tamer and a backhoe to get him into the dressing room.
Z: Maybe he’s changed.
She: And I’m pretty sure the last time you went shopping, it took you three weeks to find the best price for a pair of socks.
Z: That wasn’t us on Thursday night. On Thursday night, we did it. We dominated Black Friday.
She: Oh. That.
Z: We went out to Best Buy at eleven o’clock at night for a midnight sale. We waited in line for an hour, and then crushed those door busters!
She: Really?
Z: Well. We got there at 11 and sat in the car. It was very cold. There were people waiting in line who had been there since Tuesday at 8. That’s crazy!
She: And?
Z: Then we got a feel for the crowd, talked to a nice police officer about his Thanksgiving dinner, and watched as the masses poured into the store, about 20 at a time.
She: How did the shopping turn out?
Z: We watched people go in for about 15 minutes, and it looked like it was going to take another 15 minutes before the other 300 people were going to get in, and it was really super cold and late, so we kind of left.
She: You are shopping gods.
Z: I know, right? The only thing better would have been if we had actually trampled someone. Then it would have been a holiday.
She: Well, it might have been better if you’d actually come home with some purchases. Or gone into the store.
Z: We have you for that.
She: And the whole next generation of shoppers.
Z: Yes, dear.
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