By Ben Lockridge
No, those were not lines for Twilight screenings you saw at 4 a.m. across Meridian on Black Friday. Those were shoppers.
As is tradition, the day after Thanksgiving is a day set aside for those who have no problems with early mornings and frantic shopping.
At 4:45 a.m. Friday Best Buy had a line of more than 200 people waiting to get their hands on HD TV's and laptops.
"This isn't my first time shopping on Black Friday. Normally my wife would be here with me, but she's pregnant right now so I was sent out," said Barrett Nunnery. "I don't have a strategy. I just have specific items I'm looking for, but really it's whatever I can get to the fastest and bring it back home. It's just something I feel like I have to do, it's just a part of life."
While some did not feel strategy was important, this wasn't the case for Douglas Walker as he talked to his daughter on the phone.
"I have my daughter on the phone who is at Wal-mart and soon to be at Office Depot. She's trying to get an Xbox for her boyfriend, and I'm in line for a laptop computer, and an Ipod," he said.
Walker said he actually found Black Friday amusing.
"It's kind of fun being in all of this in the cold. It's Christmas time, and if you can get a bargain you should go and get it," Walker explained.
Then there are some with no strategy or plans at all.
"I'm only here because my husband went duck hunting, I figure he woke me up, I might as well shop. I'm looking for a Garmin and a little camera I saw was on sale," Janice Collins said.
There were many stores in Meridian that participated in early sales. Best Buy and Wal-mart opened at 5 a.m., but it wasn't the earliest bird in the bunch. J.C. Penney opened it's doors at 4 a.m. as well as Belk and Sears. The earliest doors opened for Black Friday however was Geoffrey's, which opened at midnight.
For those who did not find what they were looking for don't worry. There are only 364 days left until Black Friday 2010.
