brianatwcc

Harbor Freight, October 11th

:eyepoppin:eyepoppin:eyepoppin:eyepoppin Walgreens: $1.99 Red Baron's 12 inch pizza :2letseat::2letseat: It's the Classic Crust

One Barbie Doll Left Back up lady, I will bite Oh, sorry grandma

One day each year is designated as an official “(insert your favorite U.S. state) Day” in New York City. On this day, former residents of the designated state gather for a picnic in Central Park to share food and stories from home and to make friends that will make their new home a little less intimidating. Even when we decide to leave it all behind, it is sometimes nice to realize that some small part came along for the ride. There are some streets in “The City That Never Sleeps” that bear no resemblance to any other street in America. Instead, these streets have become immersed in the culture of their inhabitants and have marketplaces and restaurants that cater only to those residents. Even in a melting pot, you can find clusters of similarities if you know where to look. At a small holiday themed restaurant in NYC, we watch four different people walk through the front door from various walks of life. The audience knows immediately that they have something in common, they just don’t know exactly what it is. The secret is that they are all elves. Well, not exactly. Two are exiled elves, one is the child of an elf (and Santa), and the fourth is an elf on assignment. Here are the main characters. Lars: He was one of the most accomplished "elf"letes in the history of the Reindeer Games. However, Lars had a different dream. He wanted to be an Olympic "elf"lete. Lars was willing to do anything to get into the Olympic Games, and in 2008 he went to Beijing as the first and only representative of the North Pole. An entire village gathered to watch Lars make Olympic history only to be embarrassed and ashamed by his performance. Lars finished last in every Decathalon event and was featured prominently on television newscasts as the first person ever to be disqualified for running under the hurdles. Worse yet, Lars tested positive for a human growth hormone and was banned from competition for life. Unable to return home and face the people who had entrusted him with their faith, Lars moved to New York City and took a job as the host at a restaurant called "The North Pole Bar and Grill." Reginald: At one time, he was Santa's right hand man. In fact, Reg was the only elf entrusted with the responsibility of keeping Santa on track. Literally. He was the Director of the North Pole Air Traffic Control. However, Reg had a peculiar sense of humor that often was at odds with his position of trust within the Claus administration. He was verbally reprimanded when he gave four of the reindeer laxatives on Christmas Eve 2003. He was brought before the Elf Council and placed on probation for placing "You must be this tall to enter" signs outside of all of the corporate restrooms. Finally, he was banished from the North Pole entirely when he scrambled the NORAD tracking system and Santa recieved a decidedly unfriendly Air Force escort over Florida airspace. Reg now works dispatch at a NYC taxicab company. He spends most everynight at The North Pole Bar and Grill. Freddie: He knew he was different from everyone else when he was cast as a child television star at the age of 37. Freddie enjoyed a four year run as “Little Timmy” on the family oriented show “Next Door Neighbors.” Actually, Freddie enjoyed himself a little too much and was fired from the show after “America’s Favorite Twelve Year Old” was chased down the Los Angeles Freeway with four hookers and enough cocaine in his system to get the entire “90210” blitzed. He avoided serious jail time by agreeing to do a series of public service announcements and donating more money than he had made in the last two years to drug and alcohol awareness programs. In New York City for just two days, he stumbled into the North Pole Bar and Grill just about 10 minutes before last call. Elfis: He is an actual elf, sent by Santa to monitor the ex-patriated elves and determine whether they are worthy of being brought home. Just after he was born, his parents were killed in a tragic wooden block mishap at the toyshop. It turns out that all elf children who are abandoned by or lose their parents are adopted by the state and raised to become agents of the established government. Elfis is sent to NYC under the guise that he is a computer programmer putting together a website designed to help shoppers make their Christmas plans. At the North Pole Bar and Grill, he eats dinner every night at the same time at the same table. Mostly though, he watches. No one back home knows it, but Elfis has given a lot of thought to never returning to the real North Pole. Over the course of the first season, we learn the back stories of each of the main characters and see how they fell from grace. We learn that the North Pole is a small industrial town and not at all like we expect it to be. We learn that Santa’s Toy Shop is the only thriving industry in the area, and that Freddie is Santa’s love child whose mother left the North Pole in order to preserve the family legacy. We also learn that Reginald’s wife chose to stay behind and keep his kids at the North Pole and that Lars is not the only one to blame for his problems. We also see the maturation of Elfis and witness his internal struggle to determine whether or not he wants to remain part of the North Pole culture. GottaDeal is the name of the website that Elfis starts. In the pilot episode, Elfis and Freddie meet at the restaurant and Elfis talks Freddie into doing some promotional work for the website. Freddie is wholly uninterested in helping others at first, but sees the website as an easy way to fulfill the court ordered requirements of his probation. In the ensuing episodes, Elfis recruits Reginald and Lars to come onboard as well. As time passes, the company becomes very profitable and Elfis continues to struggle with his decision to stay in NYC or return to the North Pole. At the end of season one, Elfis makes his decision and it becomes clear which elves are good and which elves are not. We also follow the day to day exploits of running the GottaDeal website. The competitive juices flow anytime that the GD staff butts heads with members of the NittyGrittyDirtCheap team. Hilarity ensues when the gang discovers that they have been fed bad information by a Department Store Santa after he is fired for refusing to say “HO!, HO!, HO!” With Hackers, Cyberstalkers, and at least one guest appearance by Al Gore, the first season is set to be chock full of good times and good deals. Each season of the show would last only six episodes and would air from Thanksgiving to Christmas.

I think that it would be nice if stores worked on creating a positive atmosphere for the shoppers when they know that they will be staying in the parking lot all night. It would be nice if they brought out snacks, or had random contests for gift cards (even if it were just a series of $5 or $10 cards). Heck, they could invite a local radio station to have an all-nighter with the shoppers and give t-shirts and cds away. Most importantly, they could try and have some type of security presence. I have been the first person in line at Best Buy twice and would not feel comfortable with my wife being out their alone all night. As for actual sales - why don't some stores (especially locals and those that that don't sell McTV's with a side of surround sound) have afternoon sales. I get the premise that you spend most of your money at the first place you go, and burnout is a factor. I just can't believe that My Little Lima Bean Is Cuter Than Yours Children's Clothes, Inc. or Rambo Schwartzeneger's Store for Manly Men actually compete much for the 5-11 a.m. business. Where I live we have a plethera of strip malls that could advertise an afternoon shopapalooza to draw folks over after they have had lunch. Next, if you are going to advertise something at a discount, just sell it for a discount. A $50 mail-in-rebate that takes 8 months and 14 angry phone calls to get just doesn't seem like it is worth it. I understand the dollars and sense rationale that many/most won't bother with complying with the mail-in requirements. Heck, many don't even try. However, it seems odd that companies spend billions of dollars branding themselves and earning customer's trust to just throw it away because your self addressed stamped envelope was mustard yellow instead of the canary yellow that the fine print called for. If your statistics show that only 50% of people follow through with the rebate, then please just mark it down $25 and be done with it.