Black Friday Madness!

Yeah, this really happens.

So, I'm well aware that I'm one of those bitter folks who has been in retail for too long. But the fact of the matter is, most of the year, my job is pretty fun. I work with awesome people who are like my family, and we have a pretty good time.

But the truth is - Black Friday is my least favorite day of the whole entire year. It looms over the month of November like a thick black cloud, and now that it has crept earlier and earlier and now is into Thursday, has effectively killed my Thanksgiving.

But that's okay. It's all so you, the consumer, can save a few bucks. It comes with the job, it's not going anywhere, and I've done so many I'm the go to expert for my department (arguably the most important one in the store on this holy day).

None of that makes it any easier, and it's certainly not fun. But there are a few simple things that you - the crazy deal seeking masses who ensure that this one day keeps getting more and more and more out of hand every year - can do to make this day more safe and bearable for all.

1. Don't bring your children. First of all, people die during this thing, and if you need more of a reason than that, you're already seriously disturbed enough that you should just stay home to begin with.

2. Don't show up drunk. Because if there's any day that being belligerent and difficult will get you booted out of your favorite retailer, it's this one. We generally draw the line at when you start cussing us out, fyi - and the management team is extremely lenient when it comes to us firing back on this day. If you get snippy, we're going to get snippy back. Complain all you want, and demand that we get fired - unless you're leaving with bruises, it's not happening. 

3. Stop running, pushing, and why the hell are you yelling? I've often compared that moment when the doors open to the scene in the Lion King where Mufasa gets trampled by the stampede. As people rush through the building toward the electronics counter in a sale induced frenzy, it straight up sounds like a riot. Calm down, crazy people, we all know what we're doing here. It's not like we hide the sale items from you, you have a map that tells you where you are. (Although hiding them sounds like an amazing idea and I want to try it next year.) Also, and I know this one is hard to believe - we can hear you. There's no need to scream at us when demanding to know where the digital cameras are. My ears work just fine, thanks.


4. Do not, under any circumstances, call the store.  Any phone call that occurs during the first four hours of Black Friday madness, will either go largely ignored, or will be answered with the shortest, best guess of an answer possible. The fact of the matter is this - everything is so chaotic that we rarely actually know what we have left in stock until the dust settles anyway, so you're probably not getting the correct answer to begin with, and furthermore, there's not a chance in hell that we're going to traipse across the store to find out, nor are we going to hold whatever you ask for anyway. Save your minutes, either let the dream die, or show up like everyone else.

5. Don't touch me.  I mean really, just don't. You will get an elbow to the jaw.

6. You're going to have to wait.  The lines are long, and the team is busy. Deal with it.

7. Once the doorbusters are gone, they're gone.  Sure, we're going to tell you that we have a truck coming on Saturday morning and there's a chance that we'll get more back in just to get you out of our hair. Here's an insider tip for you: I've been to this party seven times - it's never happened, it's never going to happen. Sorry about your luck.

8. It's not the day for a tutorial.  You'd be surprised just how many times people will come up in the midst of the most chaotic few hours of the year, park themselves in front of me clutching a doorbuster camera/tv/other random electronic item, sigh with labored irritation and demand that I tell them everything that they need to know about this product. "Sigh. I don't know anything about digital cameras, can you tell me about them?" Any of the other 364 days of the year, I'd be more than happy to explain to you how cameras work. But there are punches being thrown behind you and a line of impatient, exhausted, drunks in front of you. Keep it moving and look it up online, or come back next week.

9. You get what you pay for.  There's a reason that you don't see that giant tv that you paid like ten dollars for on the wall with the tvs that we carry all year. It's because we get them in for the sole purpose of this two day event and will never see them again. Until a month from now when you haul your broken one back in and you're SOL because we can't replace it. Just saying.

10. Don't hand me your list and tell me to find you "any of this."  This happens every day of the holiday shopping season, and unless you're a sweet old lady, is completely lazy and rude.

11. The rules exist for a reason. Did you see that line outside? Yeah, that means that we have to try and make that many people happy in span of about two hours until things calm to a dull roar. So when we say there's a limit on purchasing, we mean it. And stop telling me that you have twins, triplets, are the octomom. I see you here all the time, and you've never been hauling anything but a latte and an iPhone, and even if you are straight out of an epsiode of 18 Kids and Counting, you're not getting more than one tv/camera/whatever.

12. We're people, not robots. People lose their shit during these sales. I mean really. So if we have go to get you something from the back room and it seems to take forever - that's because the back room is like a damn day spa while the war rages outside of the swing doors. It's quiet, nearly empty, cool. So while someone is pretending to look for that last tv, we take full advantage of a few moments to breathe, cry, sneak off for a drink of water, or to pee. A couple of years ago, some woman bitched me out because I wouldn't give her a deep discount on a video game that wasn't even on sale, even after the manager next to me shut her down twice. It was near the end of my shift and I was tired both physically and emotionally, and her rage fest was almost enough to push me over the edge. The man who was waiting patiently behind her until she stomped off in a huff, had been paying rapt attention the entire time. I started to ring up his purchases, and he stopped handing me things until I looked up at him - when he smiled sympathetically and said "Hey, just so you know, you're doing a really good job." It made my whole holiday season better. Seriously.


So as you head out tonight in a tryptophan and wine haze and stumble into a herd with the rest of the crazed shoppers clutching your ads and your coffee, take a minute to remember that people have been working around the clock for weeks to make sure you have the best chance of getting the items that you want. But once the floodgates open, our resources are limited and there's only so much that we can do. Being rude, pushy, and aggressive isn't going to change anything, and isn't going to help your case if there's any sort of negotiating to be had. Be nice to us, and we'll be nice to you. Isn't that some sort of golden rule or something?

"I worked that song like a hooker pole."

It's no secret, I love Glee.

Sometimes, I love to hate Glee.

Here's the deal: I know how completely ridiculous it is. I get why people hate it. It's cheesy, silly, and it's EVERYWHERE. Lea Michele is so sickeningly sweet and perky she makes you want to punch her in the face. Mark Salling is playing a high schooler but looks like he's well into his 30s. Some of the covers belong straight on a Kidz Bop compilation. Show creator Ryan Murphy has no concept of continuity. Don't even get me started on Matt Morrison. Did I mention that Lea Michele is completely exhausting?

But the thing is, some of the performances are good. Really good. Like, stuck in your head for days but you don't want to tell anyone good.

I promise.

But this is only going to work if this relationship is based on mutual giving, so you have to promise me that you'll watch each performance once.

It won't hurt, I swear.

You may even like it.

So follow me, as I count down my top ten Glee performances.

It's been a long time...

But we're going to commit to coming back to the 2 people who read this. Gonna do a little revamp of the aesthetics and then we're both going to do at least one post a week. Let the games begin!

"Guess who I'm dating? Wes Brody. He's super cute. He plays soccer with my sister. He's seven."

Everyone who knows me knows that once I get obsessed with a tv show, it's pretty much all I talk about. Before White Collar, there was Glee. Due to the creative marketing and never ending buzz, I was into this show before it ever aired. Now that the first season has finally wound to a close, and I ended it with mixed feelings, I have a few suggestions for next season.

Click below:

"Did you know dolphins are just gay sharks?"

1. Do not let Jonathan Groff go!
Writing his character as a senior was probably a big mistake. When he first showed up I was annoyed by his blatant overacting, but once he settled in to his character, he stole every scene he was in. Groff's big rock star turn during the regionals performance of Bohemian Rhapsody easily became my favorite performance of anyone on the show ever. He's a great character and has more singing talent than Mark Salling and Cory Monteith combined. Find a way to bring him back. The show is definitely going to miss him.



2. Brittany, Quinn, and Santana are underrated.
Let's face facts, Dianna Agron is the best actress this show has. (The argument can be made about Jane Lynch and her stellar comedic chops, I know.) Dianna transitioned from the bitchy alpha female cheerleader to the vulnerable fallen from grace teen so well, and the heartbreaking crying on command didn't hurt one bit. She's not an outstanding vocalist, but the sheer acting ability makes up for it. Heather Morris and Naya Rivera managed to turn Brittany and Santana into two of the most well liked characters in an ensemble cast. Everyone loves Brittany's one liners ("Mr. Schu...is he your son?") and Santana emerged as a hyper sexual firecracker with a surprisingly good voice. (I mean, who expected her at all during Like a Virgin? I know I didn't.) Use the dynamic duo more. It'd be nice to see them with an actual storyline other than Britanny says something funny, Santana says something sassy or flirts with someone, then they flirt with each other.



3. Can we get some new story lines next year?
Who didn't see the plot of the finale coming from a mile away? It was essentially the same thing that happened in a ton of other episodes, with the added bonus of Quinn finally having that baby thrown in. Coach Slyvester threatens the Glee club, Mr. Schu tears up like a woman, Rachel and Finn either fight or fall in love (again), Kurt makes reference to struggling with his sexuality, Mercedes hits that note, Glee club doesn't end after all.

Groundbreaking stuff.

The Kurt storyline got recycled so many times this year that it was easy to forget that the other characters even have lives outside of the choir room. Though it gave Mike O Malley the room to show off some impressive range (who knew the host of Guts and the star of the Time Warner commercials had legit talent?)one episode covering this topic would have been sufficient. I went to high school in Ohio ten years ago and alternative sexualities weren't even as big of a deal then as they were made to be on Glee. Personally, letting Kurt be openly gay and giving him a functional relationship with an awesome guy and having it NOT be an issue would be a more effective way to get the point across in my eyes. (But rumors have it that this is in the cards for next season. Fingers crossed.)

The Will Schuester, Emma Pillsbury romance is getting stale as well. They get so close to figuring it out and then something happens. She dates someone else, he starts making out with anyone who will have him, she dates someone else again. For someone who is so socially stunted, Emma sure does get around. Maybe it's because Will cries all the time. That's bound to put a damper on anyone's romantic plans.

Hopefully the writers will stray from the regular episodic formula next season and we'll get to see some new stuff. For example, it'd be nice to see what Rachel's dynamic with her dads is actually like. Do Mercedes, Tina, Artie and Puck even have parents, or do they all just live in the choir room in some kind of "don't get them wet, don't feed them after midnight" Gremlins type deal? It's okay to do episodes that don't revolve around Kurt, Rachel, and Finn. I won't tell, I promise.


4. Make better use of the stellar guest stars.
If you're a show that has access to Idina Menzel, Kristin Chenoweth, and Neil Patrick Harris (just to name a few), you hang on to those names and those voices for all that they're worth and gave them something solid to work with. The character of April Rhodes is weakly written and largely useless. Sad stuff, since Kristin has an amazing voice, great chemistry with Matt Morrison, and great comedic timing. Having April show up should be an event, not an afterthought with some lackluster songs thrown in the mix.

The Idina Menzel story line is a whole other story. It's a solid character with obvious flaws, but condensing a plot point as major as revealing her as Rachel's mother and then her insistence that she doesn't want to be a part of her life into two episodes was a biiig mistake.(Not to mention that weird performance of Poker Face as the one song they were ever going to sing together...I mean I know it was the Lady Gaga episode, but really? Did everyone forget that "Speechless" exists?) Not to mention her magical instant adoption of Quinn's baby at the end of the season. Who knew adopting a baby was as easy as going to the hospital and filling out a form. Apparently a lot of people are doing it wrong.

If you're going to have Broadway royalty on your show (and lets face it, it's a trend that will continue), use them well.

5. Better song choices, please.
First of all, unlatch from Journey already. That first performance of Don't Stop Believin' was magical, tear jerking, awe inspiring. It set the tone for the first half of the season. Bringing it back for the finale couldn't even revive it, not to mention throwing together a completely underwhelming medley for the regionals performance. With a fan base that is largely under 30, Journey, Kiss, and that god awful "To Sir, With Love" performance are not going to hold the attention that the Avril Lavigne, Kelly Clarkson, Lady Gaga songs will. The surprises in the first half of the season (Bust Your Windows, No Air, etc) were great reminders of modern songs that may have been forgotten over the last couple of years. But "Rose's Turn", "A House Is Not A Home", "Give Up the Funk" took what could have been amazing moments and turned them into forgettable scenes.

At the very least, if there's going to be an insistence on taking obscure older songs and turning them into performances, at least put them on par with the Vocal Adrenaline performances. "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Another One Bites the Dust" are two completely dated, forgettable songs made cool again by the flawless performances from the rival club. It's been done, calling out Lea Michele's out of the park performance of "Don't Rain On My Parade" from the end of the first half of season one, but that magic hasn't seemed to be recaptured since.

Also, for the love of God, stop Mr. Schu's embarrassing rapping moments. Matt Morrison is a ridiculously talented singer, but I've never suffered more second hand embarrassment than I do whenever he busts out some ridiculous hip hop number. Also, if you're going to have Quinn sing, keep her in the ballpark of "Papa Don't Preach" and "Say A Little Prayer", that weird pregnant ballet of "It's a Mans, Mans, Mans World"...odd, and totally out of her range.

I was not looking forward to the theme episodes, but the Madonna episode became my favorite of the season. The "4 Minutes" performance was exactly what it should have been, and "Like A Virgin" went from a light and bouncy song to a steamy and sexy song with the chosen performance. Or I guess as much as it can be when you're singing during foreplay and are a show about teenagers.

In spite of the obvious cracks that became evident during season one, I'm not going anywhere. I still love the show, it's still a unique concept that has been executed better than was to be expected, and is bringing musicals to the forefront, which is never a bad thing as far as I'm concerned. Hopefully season two will give the other characters room to grown and get the show back on track with some stronger musical numbers.

The back nine was largely a disappointment for me, but did have some shining moments: Tina scaring Principal Figgins with her vampire act, The Safety Dance, Total Eclipse of the Heart, Puck trying and failing at hooking up with Mercedes ("I'm going to ask you to stop, because I'm starting to get embarrassed for you."), and Emma's rant about Will being a slut, ("Nobody's safe. NOBODY'S SAFE.") to name a few, but I have hope that it'll rebound in a solid fashion next season. It's still better than lot of shows around right now, I think it just set a standard for itself with the first few episodes that was nearly impossible to maintain.

I'm just not sure the point of it all was to make me wish that the show was focused on Vocal Adrenaline instead of New Directions....

I'm notoriously known for judging other people based on their tastes in movies, music, and books. Now I feel it's time for me to confess a few of my own. (Rest assured, I do still find a few guilty pleasures unforgivable...everyone who loves Twilight, I'm looking at you.)


Short is the joy that guilty pleasures bring...




Miley Cyrus - See You Again (Rock Mafia Remix)

I want to preface this by saying that I find Miley Cyrus to be one of the most annoying people on the planet. As a result, I almost feel like this song was wasted on her, but I do love it, and it's impossible not to sing along with once you get it in your head. Especially the 'My best friend Leslie said 'Oh, she's just being Miley!' part. I'm pretty sure Miley's bff is that girl Mandy who is in all of her Youtube videos. Poor Leslie, dropped like a bad habit once Miley made it big...but I'm sure she'll turn up for the E! True Hollywood Story.



Selena Gomez - Falling Down

Selena Gomez looks exactly like a real life Bratz doll to me. That said, I happened to watch the Princess Protection Program movie and immediately decided that she's super cute. Not cute in the traditional sugary sweet Disney kid way. Cute in the kind of way too sassy for her own good, we'll probably be hearing about her cussing out an assistant and throwing a cell phone at their head in the future way.



The Rachel Zoe Project.

I can't really figure out why I watch this show. The actual content is incredibly boring, the outfits that they put together are mostly fugly. Taylor hates everything, Rachel is only mildly interesting, and Brad is too fabulous for words and should spin off immediately. What I'm really fascinated by is the butchering of the language, of course. Where. Everything. Is. It's. Own. Sentence? With. Like. Random. Questions? Thrown. Into. The. Middle? Of. Them. Oh. My. God. I. Died. Bananas. Shut. It. Down? Vintage. Chanel. You get the picture.




Britney Spears - The Circus Tour

Right around the time that Britney went bat shit, I developed a soft spot for her music. Blackout and Circus have become two of my most played cds ever. As a result, when she took her psycho circus on the road, I was totally tapped in. I love the shades of crazy that we still get, like when she starts talking about Christmas in the middle of the summer and things of that nature. I think I can safely say that I've seen all of this show via Youtube, and my favorite numbers are the first two. Circus and Piece of me are as well staged as they could be for an artist that never sings and doesn't dance anymore. A bonus in this video is Britney ripping out one of her awesome extensions at the 7:22 mark.



I fully expected to hate Glee, and then fell in love with it so hard that I'm eagerly seeking out the performances for the next episode that surface a few day before it airs. Thankfully it stays as far away from taking it self seriously as possible, because if this show came off the least bit pretentious, it would be over. It's fun and light and written to be quite snappy and sarcastic, but the music is where it really shines. I'd pretty much watch Lea Michele and Amber Riley sing the phone book for an hour every Wednesday and be happy about it.

I'm hoping that in calling out a few of my own guilty pleasures, I can now be on the road to recovery. The first step to healing is admitting that you have a problem. God grant me the serenity...

Twitter, oh Twitter

So, first let me start by saying neither Maggie nor I are addicted or obsessed with this blog, apparently. It's really quite sad because we had such lofty goals in the beginning. But don't give up on us yet. I know we'll continue to blog when the urge strikes. That said, the urge has struck me. There's something I've been wanting to blog about for a while now just as one of those pet peeve sorta things.

So back in the good ole days of 2007, Maggie tells me about this new thing called Twitter that Kevin Pereira from G4TVs Attack of the Show had been talking about. And she says I really gotta get on there cause Kevin's so awesome. And I resisted for a little while because I didn't "get it". I was still all into MySpace (see, I said, the good ole days!) and was really trying to even get a grasp on that Facebook thing. Didn't really want another thing to get caught up in. But sure enough, my arm didn't need much twisting because, yeah, I'm a techie at heart and like to see these new things early on.

I joined and followed Maggie and Kevin and singer/songwriter Matt Morris for what feels like forever because in it's infancy, no one was really doing the whole Tweeting thing. When I finally remembered I had one and went back to it after a few months, I started to get it because of it's simplicity and to this day, that's the thing I love most about it. Call me a victim of the MTV generation with the whole lack of being able to pay attention to anything for very long. I was getting sick of MySpace and people's ridiculously decorated pages and I still was (and kinda am not) feeling Facebook and all the damn quizzes and stuff. So, yes, Twitter was becoming and still is my social networking site of choice. The app on my iPhone made it so easy to fall deeper and deeper in love with it, too.

Given all of that, I don't want to say that I'm like the Queen of Twitter cause I know I'm far from that. BUT having been around it for longer than a bunch of people that I now follow, kinda leaves room for me to make some observations that are generally reasons for me to stop following people and it makes me sad even though I'm sure someone might be able to say the same about me for some reason or another. I mean there are real, legitimate friends who I wish there was a way to stop getting their updates because they're such annoying Twitterers but I don't because I don't want them to see I stopped following thus causing some sort of Twitter War because of feelings being hurt. So, I'm resorting to blogging my general annoyances and if I stop following you, it's not personal. I just don't wanna be annoyed when I log on to my favorite little website of the moment.

Here's the lowdown...

• Don't tweet too much - There's nothing I hate more than when I see on Friendbar (a ticker of tweets for Firefox) the same pic/name for like 10 posts. Twitter's 140 characters for a reason. If you got more to say than that, take it to a blog or Facebook or something.
  
• Learn how to use RT - Retweet stuff that you want everyone to know, not just when you feel the need to reply to someone. I don't see when you reply to people I don't know for a reason, and I like it.
  
• Do you really think P Diddy is gonna see you tweeting him? - I get the whole loving the fact that Twitter gives you a bit of accessibility to celebrities in a way that we've never seen before but really, said celebs are likely getting thousands of @ replies and there's a slim to none chance that you're gonna get a reply or acknowledgment when you try. That said, it's not completely wrong to do, just don't do it all the time, cause really? It's ridiculous.
• Trending - Sure, some trending topics are fun, but man, it's not a competition to get something to be a trending topic (though some are amusing) and making every tweet of your day a # is just wow, too much.
  
• Sharing of information - There's a bunch of people that are either TMI or not enough info. I think the people who share waaaaaay too much are equally as annoying as the vague ones. It's like both are searching for attention and replies and it's just frustrating...okay, wait, I think I hate the vague ones more cause it's like "Really, WTF are you talking about?!"
• TV Tweeting - I like to see what the people I'm following are into, as far as TV and music and all that fun stuff, but man, when you feel the need to give me a play by play of what you're watching, there's a problem. Step away from the computer or cell phone and just WATCH THE FUCKING SHOW. I don't need to know every detail of it. If I did, I'd be watching it myself.
  

I'm sure there's many, many more things that peeve me about the way people are on Twitter but those are the ones that come to mind. Again, if you notice I stopped following you, no offense...you're probably doing at least one of these if not a combination of them and I just can't take it.

An open letter to Matt Nathanson.

Dear Matt Nathanson,

It's about damn time.

Love, Maggie


So, news broke this week that Matt Nathanson is FINALLY releasing another single. Falling Apart is going to usher us into the summer! I can only consider this the best birthday present ever, since Come On Get Higher long ago entered dangerously overplayed status for me, so this news leaves me positively thrilled.

I was going to make a pro and con list, but can see nothing but pros thus far. It's the perfect summer song. Great energy, catchy, perfect for highlighting during the billions of tour dates that he has lined up. It'll take me awhile to get tired of hearing it during every tv performance that he does, and the pictures from the video shoot look promising. I love when a series of videos has some sort of continuity to them, and since the same model that was featured in the Come On Get Higher video was also hired for this one, I have incredibly high hopes!



There has been other stuff going on. Life and love (and lack thereof) and things of that nature, but this new single is the best news I've gotten all week! (The second best news was the announcement of the In the Heights tour, but that is another entry all together and will be coming soon!) For now, go ahead and get acquainted with this song before you start hearing it on the radio and wondering who the hell is singing it.