The Big Day

Yesterday was The Big Day at the cafe. We had DJ's in the parking lot and free cinnamon rolls and free coffee if you said "Willy sent me." (Willy is the name of the giant rooster mascot). Obviously, we were busy, but not as busy as I would have expected. I didn't hear what our sales figure was for the day, but from the orders coming in it looked like people did more than just pick up the free stuff. Next week when everything goes back to normal (meaning slow) will certainly be interesting. And I'm sure that the other coffee places, like the bakery I used to work at, enjoyed having the radio DJ's repeating endlessly for four hours that the cafe has the best coffee in Prescott. I'm sure there won't be any blow-back from that in a small town.

I've been really sick the last few days, which made working yesterday even more fun. When I got home, my temp was over 100 degrees, which isn't bad for me (102 and even 104 is not uncommon), but it made being on my feet in a hot restaurant somewhat interesting. I assume from the other symptoms it's pneumonia, although I haven't had that since leaving Michigan. I have an appointment with my doctor on Tuesday, so I'll know for sure what's up then. I'm sure some magic pills will take care of everything. Better living through chemistry.

Black Friday seemed to have been good for retailers, if you ignore that they were basically losing money on every item they sold. But I'm sure they will make it up on volume. And you have to factor in the cost of repairing their stores and paying off lawsuits. At least all the kiddies will have plenty of useless crap to unwrap on December 25th.

And now that we are officially in the "holiday season," I'll do my annual Scrooge bit. Every year, Christmas seems more pointless and stupid. Sure it's a good excuse to get together with family to eat and drink too much. That part I have no problem with, even though we won't be this year. But the whole gift thing just annoys me to no end, especially when it involves people I barely know. Family and friends are no problem, but co-workers and bosses and casual aquantances and the mailman and classmates and teachers and the guy that sweeps the sidewalk in front of Salvation Army and the old dude I nod and "huh" to when I pass him on the way to work and... Why? What possible meaning can be behind a gift to someone I barely know? What could I buy them that wouldn't just end up in the next garage sale? People at the cafe, some of whom can't even afford a place to live, want to do a secret Santa thing. But it will be so "fun," sort of like sticking a fork in my eye is fun. And don't even get me started on those buy-video-games-for-poor-people lists that now seem ubiquitous in the work place. Please explain what criteria allows someone to be defined as "poor" while having an Xbox/PlayStation/Wii in the first place, then expecting me to buy them new games for it? I don't even have an Xbox/PlayStation/Wii (although Rock Band may yet convince me to pick up a Wii).

OK, now that I've lost my five regular readers, I'll shut up.