Black Friday Shopping Spree Nets New Wardrobe

I know I swore I'd stay in, but I managed to make it to the Roosevelt Field Mall on the most notoriously crowded shopping day of the year. I think it was because my brother called and told me he went shopping at 6 in the morning. He's my inspiration. He was looking for a toy, but by the time he got to the Carle Place Toys R Us they had run out. Rats!

When he got there, the crowds had dispersed. Bro attributes this to everyone shopping in the middle of the night to beat the crowds only to leave the place empty. Toys R Us opened at midnight on Thanksgiving.

It wasn't as bad as I would have thought because I went in the evening. So there I was on Black Friday braving the crowds that remained because I needed a dress for my office's annual Christmas Hanukkah party. Last year I wore a red dress with an A-line skirt. My co-workers raved about how fabulous they thought I looked. They told me I should wear more red because it creates a beautiful contrast against my dark brown hair.

So this time I bought a strapless red Jessica McClintock that comes halfway down my thighs and has a poofy skirt. I love it. It's the kind of dress I would have made fun of as a mid-90s high school student. But now with leggings and large tops coming back, it's adorable. When I looked at photos of my older brother's junior prom in 1988, I noticed that the girls wore dresses just like mine along with big hair and tons of mousse. As a little girl, I used to crimp my hair to get that same look. While I will wear the clothes from that era, I can pass on the hair.

I went to the Awesome 80s Prom in the fall but didn't dress for the occasion. If I go again, I already have a dress to recycle. I was too young to wear one like it back in that era. Incidentally, my friend saw LisaLisa on NBC this morning. He said that she was "no longer the hotness" she once was. We're talking over twenty years, and aging is a bigger bitch to women than it is to men. She's touring again.

Eighties style aside, red is seasonably appropriate for me. I once knew a redhead who complained that her hair color forbade her to wear red. She hated it, although I thought she had beautiful hair. My quest for a dress led to me dropping a few hundred dollars at Macy's for a new wardrobe, two pairs of black pants and a few tops, including a styled green sweater. I've noticed that green looks great on redheads.

The line wasn't long at all by the time I got to the store. A customer ahead of me was bickering with the sales clerk. She tried to gain my sympathy. The clerk had been rude to her the whole time. She expressed to me what she'd been dying to tell the clerk but couldn't bring herself to,"If you've been stressed all day and you're tired, go home." Black Friday understandably drove the clerk off the deep end.

But, I'm so happy I went shopping last night instead of going out. That's for tonight. My friend told me her sister went to a nightmarish speed dating event this Black Friday. I went to one of those once and vowed never to subject myself to that torture and humiliation again. You're practically forced to date someone you'd normally turn down. And there are regulars because the events are doomed to fail.

I've been wary about doing a speed dating event in Huntington. I'm afraid I will run into Lightweight. You might remember that freak from one of my earlier entries. He's the jerk who swore I was once a man.