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Official One-and-Only "What I Got" & "My Black Friday Experience" Thread


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Posted
Well, I didn't make it out to black friday shop. did my online shopping. First, BB - PSP3 bundle (may return)got the PSP controller, motion controller, webcams, $100 itunes card for $60 ( Cancelled) repurchased $100 itunes for $80...uggg. Game Stop - PSP3 bundle. Office Max - cordess phone with 4 units. Nordstrom - Born booties I been ogling for months Originally $150 and got for $74. Shoes.com got same Born booties in different color for $112. TOYSRUS - Thomas Train starter set for $12.
Posted

Wow! Who had Kindle Fire advertised at $123.38?

Nobody. A Target in CT (maybe more) put up a sign and offered the deal and deal hunters have been going nuts running around to WM etc. to get it price matched. There's a thread in Offline Hot Deals. I don't think the success rate is very high but persistence helps. Tonight's probably the last chance to get it so I'd head out now if you're interested.

Posted
I was at WM AT 9pm on 11/24. Got everything i wanted to get that went on sale at 10pm. Left WM and went to Kohl's. Got there at 11:30 and waited in the car till almost midnight. Started walking toward the front door and it was absolutley crazy. Me and my mother didn't believe they were going to let everyone that was waiting in the doors, SO we went to hhgregg to get a TV my mom wanted. My dad then got in line and me and my mom left and went back to Kohl's to meet back up to my Aunt and we got everything we wanted there. Now the line was wrapping all the way around the building..it was a crazy line. but it moved fast. Then went back to WM around 2:30 Started looking around for the stuff people decided they didn't want.. and found a bunch of the 4gb and 8gb SD cards I was in need of. I also got stuff that wasn't on sale but knew I needed for Christmas. Finally made it to the Mall around 4. Went to Every single store in the whole DANG place...Got to my parents house around 8:30am on BF morning. went and hid all the goodies we got. and I then drove home and crashed.. I'm not as young as I usta be.. 24+ hours killed me this go around!!!!
Posted

Here is my take on BF here in South Jersey. My BF adventure included the following stores: Kohl's, Target, Gamestop, Macy's, Boscov's, JDR Shoes (local discount shoe retailer that advertised 10% off UGGs from 6am-10am), Wal-Mart. Although my wife and I had a very productive shopping experience, it came with a number of obstacles from the following stores:

 

Kohl's - Only opened one set of doors and had shopping carts located throughout the store instead of being parked by the doors.

 

Gamestop - Sold us a "new" game in which the original box was not available. We exchanged it at another store later in the day and found that there were no instructions included in the previous purchase.

 

Boscov's - The "Its in the Bag" promotion at 4am lasted over an hour waiting in a line that snaked from the parking lot to the auditorium in which one employee informed the customer of their prize (I got a $15 gift card, my wife got a $10 gift card).

 

Wal-Mart - Can be summed up in one word, disorganization.

 

We got in line at Kohl's at 11:30pm and did not stop until 3:30pm. We had breakfast at Maggianos's, who advertised their BF Breakfast Buffet for the second year in a row.

Posted

Here is my take on BF here in South Jersey. My BF adventure included the following stores: Kohl's, Target, Gamestop, Macy's, Boscov's, JDR Shoes (local discount shoe retailer that advertised 10% off UGGs from 6am-10am), Wal-Mart. Although my wife and I had a very productive shopping experience, it came with a number of obstacles from the following stores:

 

Kohl's - Only opened one set of doors and had shopping carts located throughout the store instead of being parked by the doors.

 

Gamestop - Sold us a "new" game in which the original box was not available. We exchanged it at another store later in the day and found that there were no instructions included in the previous purchase.

 

Boscov's - The "Its in the Bag" promotion at 4am lasted over an hour waiting in a line that snaked from the parking lot to the auditorium in which one employee informed the customer of their prize (I got a $15 gift card, my wife got a $10 gift card).

 

Wal-Mart - Can be summed up in one word, disorganization.

 

We got in line at Kohl's at 11:30pm and did not stop until 3:30pm. We had breakfast at Maggianos's, who advertised their BF Breakfast Buffet for the second year in a row.

I'm in South Jersey as well & I was at JDR for the 10% off of Uggs too!!

Posted

Did anyone try to use the Younlers $10 coupon today??? Here is my experience:

 

Went to my local Younkers this morning armed with the $10 coupon from the ad in yesterday's paper. WHAT A CROCK OF SH**!! (pardon my language)

 

I got in the line 3 times, thinking I had it figured out and each time was told the coupon would not work on what I wanted to purchase! First, I had 4 pair of socks....:"Sorry, those are Doorbusters"

Then, 5 pieces of $2.00 fudge...."Sorry, an individual item has to be at least $10" Then, a clearance item...."Sorry, that is a YELLOW DOT" clearance. AAGGHH! After tromping around the store for another 30 minutes, I see that 90% of the store has green "Doorbuster" signs on it. The ONLY items I saw that had the tiny little "you may use your $10 coupon on this" signs was a $189 bedding set and a $79 purse!

I was not the ONLY one frustrated with the complicated exclusions. There were people all over the store commenting on it. Some laughed...it was a joke. Some, like me, were mad and felt tricked. I ended up leaving and left the coupon laying on the steps outside the door of the store. Let some other sucker try and figure out how to use the worthless coupon.

In the past, Younkers was always one of my early stops on Black Friday, armed with the $10 coupon and I have NEVER had such trouble using it before! Well, those days are done for me and many others. I will NEVER waste any time or effort on Younkers BF coupon again. I suppose there are many executives at Younkers HQ chuckling over this one. Gee.....what else can we add to the fine print to make sure that no one gets to use this coupon???? Very funny. Well, your plan may of backfired. I am not the only one who left a Younkers with a bad feeling today. I have even seen mention of your stupid coupon on Black Friday message boards and blogs today. Younkers is the joke of Black Friday stories this year!

That's funny because I had the same issues and didn't even end up getting anything with mine & I had 3 of them I didn't bother using for the exact same reasons!
Posted

Gosh, after reading all the news stories Nd reports here, why does it seem like the violent incidents only happen at Walmart? You'd think best buy would have problems considering the amount of dedication the campers have yet they always seem to be civilized?

 

What is it about a cheap towel that sheds that makes people lose their crap!?

Posted

In all the years I've been shopping on BF, I've never seen the police present at Walmart. The Wally World I shop in is in a small town. I figured maybe a fight had broken or something but then when I heard what had happened in CA and AZ, I figured maybe they were just being cautious...anywho...

 

Wally World was a zoo as usual. The store was supposed to open at 4 am (I'm one of those blue law states!) but they let us in about 20 min early. Whoopie! By then I just wanted to get warm.

 

Two things I hated: Like last year they had every damn aisle blocked off for the people wanting to get the big ticket items. The aisles are so small to start with, then you block off half of them so getting around is a real pain. Second, as usual none of the zillion Wally World employees standing around looking lost had any CLUE as to where anything was. I actually helped two other shoppers find items they were looking for! One woman asked two employees where the waffle makers were. I only knew where they were because I passed by them three times as I meandered up and down the aisle. One of the employees told her "it's probably around here somewhere", I pointed it out to her further down the aisle by saying "see the purple box"? Then another lady was looking for the Hanes zip hoodies and couldn't find them. Luckily I had found them and pointed them out to her. She was very grateful.

 

There were some things I couldn't find: The Disney storybooks (could not find a balloon for this item, searched everywhere and asked two employees who were no help) and the blow up snowman was right where it should've been in the lawn and garden area but when I first went in there, they told me they were just doing TV's in there! I did go back and got the damn snowman.

 

After a while I felt like I was on a friggin' scavenger hunt...who needs a map? They're no good anyway, since nothing is where it says it's going to be.

 

One thing I found interesting was later Friday night I went to another Walmart and there were TONS of things left: big screen TV's, all the clothes they had on sale, the Rubbermaid sets.

 

As for the rest of my BF experience, other than getting overly tired, it went quite well. Got a great parking spot at the mall, received an unexpected snowglobe just for walking in the door to JC Penney (I never shop there--just walked in to get into the mall!)

Posted

I ended up at 2 walmarts. One at 9:05- only to walk out when we realized ALL door busters were given out early including midnight ones... But before we left I witnessed a little girl get hit continuously with carts while her mother left her to look for a cart. And people knew what they were doing when they hit her because they literally cussed her mother out for bringing her. I felt horrible for the child. There were so many children! The earlier time factored in im sure

 

Second Walmart was much more civilized in general but a man hit a woman for accidentally bumping him with her cart. Police took him away.

 

I just don't get why it only seems to happen at walmarts. Maybe these stories are the reason targets ad is never so impressive as to bring out the crazy crowds.

Posted

My experiences don't rank up in the same level as others posted here or compare to the horror stories I've heard with Wal-Mart.

 

I can tell you that Wednesday night I was waiting for the Best Buy ad to come online at midnight or 1AM. Well both times cames and gone and no ad was posted yet. Waited until 2AM, no ad posted. At that point it was the time I decided to go line up at Best Buy. So as I'm driving to Best Buy, I can see it's getting close to 3AM. So I stop at near by gas stations along the way, pull out the laptop, and see if the ad had been posted yet. Stil nothing. So by this point then I get to Best Buy and figured since they didn't have free wifi available in the area I was out of luck. Well a couple hours later around 6:30 a nice couple that was camped out behind me in line, said that they had a mobile hotspot device and that I could borrow their wifi. I tell this couple and their hotspot made my day complete, because once I was on I checked Best Buy saw the ad posted, saw the one item I wanted wasn't out of stock yet, was able to purchase one of this item, and now someone in my family is going to be super happy.

 

After that the rest of the time was spent waiting in line until Best Buy opened at midnight. During the wait there was music, and the couple behind me had a portable generator set up. Eventually some other people took notice this and the couple was willing to share, so a guy busted out a TV and an Xbox. At one point someone even grilled up some hamburgers for some folks. Now sure the wait was long, the air was cold, and the worst part of all there was no port-a-potty near by, so the nearest option I could find was a wal-mart 2 minutes up the road, which wasn't helpful if you had to go in a hurry, :(. Other than that though, everyone was very friendly, the line was very orderly, no fights broke out or nothing. At 5pm and 11pm, the local news station was there doing interviews. It was all fun.

 

Once the store opened I managed to get inside and get all I wanted:

 

1xPS3 Holiday Bundle for myself (Birthday present from my folks)

1x42" HDTV for $199.99 (stood in line and picked this up for my cousin)

1x24" HDTV for $79.99 (stood in line and picked this up for my sister-in-law)

1xToshiba Blu-ray player (stood in line and picked this up for a friend)

1xToshiba 320GB external HDD (stood in line and picked this up for a friend)

couple Blu-rays for myself

and...

a 16GB flash drive for me and my cousin.

 

After than I zipped over to the nearby Wal-Mart and was able to snag a copy of Dance Central 2 for Xbox Kinect for $15, thus completing my Black Friday shopping trip and there by getting everything I ultimately wanted and needed to get. All I can say is that I can't wait to do it again next year.

 

Oh and to those of you wondering, I enjoy the sport of camping at Best Buy on Black Friday. I love it so much so that each year I offer to stand in line for family and friends who otherwise would never stand in line as long as is required. naturally those who I line up for do give me a little something, which I in turn use get a couple movies or a game or two that's on sale, so it's all good.

 

I tell you this though, to everyone around this area who knows me considers me THE Black Friday "go to guy" whether they want the details on the latest ad drops or need me to stand in line or whatever, I'm right there ready to help.

Posted

The time we went was a huge factor for us. Off work at 2:30 AM and to the first store at 3:30 AM.

1. Walmart-Various DVD's, Wrangler Jeans

2. Best Buy-DVD's, iTunes Cards

3. Target-DVD's, TCU Fleeces,Kids Games

4. Academy-Nike Shirts

5. Bed Bath and Beyond-iPad iHome, Cider K-Cups

 

Academy was the only busy store when we went and overall not a bad outing. We finished with breakfast at Denny's and were back home by 6:30 AM.

Posted

This was my first true Black Friday experience. I've been to Black Friday twice before this year, but was just a teenager and not really buying anything with my own money. I had to work Thursday and Friday night, so I brought my laptop to work to shop online.

 

Wednesday night I bought a 42 inch 1080p TV for $299 from Newegg for my parents. This purchase was easy and no problems at all. I bought the TV at about 11 pm and went back to the website at 3 AM and they were all sold out.

 

Thursday night I mainly shopped online at Wal-Mart. This was extremely frustrating. They would not give a specific time of when their items would be available to purchase. On their Facebook page they just kept saying "early Friday morning", which is so subjective and not helpful. I started checking at 11 PM (central time here) and checked on the hour until 2 AM. Actually, I think their sale started at about 1:50 AM, which is quite odd. I got everything in my cart, but when I went to check out I received multiple error messages. I didn't freak out too bad though because people on the Wal-Mart forum on here were receiving the same error messages. I had to repeat the checkout process multiple times and by the time I got done, I had lost several items out of my cart. I managed to check out with the $5.97 pajamas, $49 digital camera, $5 camera case, $19 shop vac, and the $36 Bissell vacuum cleaner. I wanted the $2 waffle maker, $9 crock pot, $6.88 sheets, and $1.88 towels. The towels were never available online for me to purchase. I went back to the website Friday night and the crockpot and sheets were available again, so I grabbed those up.

 

On Friday night I ordered a couple of things from J.C. Penney. I got a $9.88 waffle maker that was originally $60, which I think is better deal than the $2 Wal-Mart one (for me) because I had been wanting a waffle maker before the sale. It's one of those flip/rotating ones made of stainless steel. I bought $8 hand towels for $3.48, $20 slippers for $14, and $26 pajamas for $8.88.

 

Not sure if I got the very best deals available, but I feel pretty good about my purchases. I don't mind spending a little more to not have to deal with the crowds, rudeness, and all that goes with it.

Posted
Mine started Wednesday online. Got the 2 mp3 players at qvc the ones I wanted for a price I was willing to pay with the memory the kids wanted. :). Thanks gotta deal. Then during the drive to thanksgiving I noticed penneys went live and they had the bracelets (sister) that I had tried to get last year on sale. Called mom and she got that. Then I stayed up all night as had slept some on the way up and did the walgreens run scoring some of the register rewards some iTunes cards and got $280 of stuff for $140 out of pocket not my best wags run but I was getting gifts not coupon items. Then headed to kmart and scored the pillows I was after some gloves and a few other miscellaneous things. Then went home. Slept about 3 hours thanksgiving day then went to walmart that night and got a vacuum cleaner for sister in law a single cup coffee maker the crockpot the blender the luggage. Went home and slept until 3:00 then got up went to the mall and went to pennys where I got their cookwear set then went to herbergers aeropostle American eagle lids sears then finished ds went to game stop to spend his money. Then we finished up at Hancock fabric. I did like the mall crowds at that time of day. I could get the door buster prices without fighting he crowds.
Posted

LOL...you must think like me and not run into the same amount of lazy people as I have. I was brought up w/ a good work ethic but most ppl these days could care less. I'm relatively young at 32 and it surprises me when I hear similar things or even people showing up and doing the bare minimum to keep their jobs.

Where I work is full of people calling out, they knew in advance they weren't going to work, waited until too late to get scheduled off and just call out..... Increases the stress for the rest of us.... it's a call center, we need a certain number of people there to take calls..... I feel for the people there tomorrow, I have PTO but Mondays are always bad, too many people just decide to take Monday off....

Posted

The article is more about projections and expectations than register receipts and may be self-promotion. My experience is that a lot of merchandise went unsold. No doubt online sales were up, but B&M sales are still so much more important that these stats do not make or break a BF. Also, there is the matter of returns. If the unsold stock blows out, I may return some of my purchases.

 

Were I a betting man, I would say that increased hours translated to increased traffic but that purchases were of less expensive items. Time will tell...

 

I am with you. The Walmarts that I visited would indicate that they took it in the shorts this Black Friday. Tons of unsold doorbusters that nobody wisely wanted.

Posted

Where I work is full of people calling out, they knew in advance they weren't going to work, waited until too late to get scheduled off and just call out..... Increases the stress for the rest of us.... it's a call center, we need a certain number of people there to take calls..... I feel for the people there tomorrow, I have PTO but Mondays are always bad, too many people just decide to take Monday off....

I remember this well. That was my last job, except on top of just calling in we had one guy(call rep) who showed up 15 minutes late practically every other day and did crappy work throughout he day anyhow and another lady(office&back up rep) who showed up late and consistently screwed things up. I blame management for ALLOWING this stuff to happen and it's the other employees who get screwed. Surely showing up late consistently is a sign that you do not take your work seriously and cannot perform your duties as required.

 

It was always explained to me that as said ppl fell into a "minority" group it was practically impossible to fire them. If that is so, the state/federal government needs to look into changing that. Surely screwing up a weekly report which affects customer billing approx 50% of the time is grounds for dismissal after several years regardless the color of someone's skin. More so if when it's addressed the person just shrugs and says "I'll try harder next time" sarcastically.

Posted

[Q. All I can say is that I can't wait to do it again next year.

 

Oh and to those of you wondering, I enjoy the sport of camping at Best Buy on Black Friday. I love it so much so that each year I offer to stand in line for family and friends who otherwise would never stand in line as long as is required. naturally those who I line up for do give me a little something, which I in turn use get a couple movies or a game or two that's on sale, so it's all good.

 

I tell you this though, to everyone around this area who knows me considers me THE Black Friday "go to guy" whether they want the details on the latest ad drops or need me to stand in line or whatever, I'm right there ready to help.

 

I end up doing much the same thing. i spent my birthday delivering the joy to all of the happy recipients. One scary footnote: I delivered the ASUS Transformer to a friend. He passed it to his 6 year old son to put inside. I then saw the 6 year old come back out with the item unboxed, but still in the wrapping. I told the friend that his son was coming out with it, and as you might have guessed it, it was dropped from arm's length to the sidewalk! We immediately inspected it, and then proceeded to plug it in, and thankfully, a thin client with an SSD internally helped it to survive and all was fine.

Posted

I am with you. The Walmarts that I visited would indicate that they took it in the shorts this Black Friday. Tons of unsold doorbusters that nobody wisely wanted.

From the fights in some areas, I would say that the cheap doorbusters were the wanted items and the more expensive items might have languished a bit. I was surpised how long some of the larger items were available online (and since I was one of the people checking those items, I should know). Did my last checks Friday afternoon and there were still a few items online. I think people hard hit by the economy went more for necessity type items again... Just my thoughts.

Posted

Reguarding the younkers coupon...

 

Every year it does seem to get harder to use the coupon but I make sure to read the fine print and love that they added the signs on items you can use the coupon on. I find using it on clothing is the easiest way to go. This year I bought a Calvin Klein dress that was $128 marked down to $19.99 and with the coupon was only $9.99! It will be perfect for my dh's work christmas party. They had a whole rack of these cheap dresses. Wish I had more coupons!

Posted

What I got... a lot of stuff (mostly clothes, some toys, my dustbuster (TGT), Panini maker and Quesadilla maker (Macy's))

 

What I paid... sleep - and I miss it terribly!

 

Will NOT do the all night thing ever again! I still can't see straight I'm so tired and my body is wacked - doesn't know if it should be awake or asleep!

 

Saturday I picked up the camera my mom wanted at Office Depot and a label maker for our house (our's broke) and I got a laptop at the BX for a friend and a few toys that were also on sale at the BX (elephant ball popper thingy was $15) - I do enjoy the no tax benefit at the BX, I will be getting hubby's iPad2 there as well

 

My husband had already purchased TV for the girls, today I get to go back to the BX and get my $60 back since they are on sale today. (So 2 Samsung TVs for $199 ea)

 

Luckily I planned ahead and I have Monday off from work to recouperate!

Posted

What I got:

 

DVD's and Blu-Rays from Amazon; actually have been getting those for the past week or so

 

Wal-Mart: Battlefield 3, COD 4 & Uncharted 2 all for PS3, Princess Tiana doll w/ stroller and bed, candy land, chutes & ladders

 

Target: Imaginext T-Rex, various dvd's and Wii games

 

I left home @8PM and was back by 1:10AM, up again @ 5:30 as a local shoe store had Uggs at 10% off.

 

All in all, this year I did more purchasing online and I have enjoyed it. All of my big purchases with the exception of the leappad are complete.

Posted
I only bought one thing: 46-inch led tv from Sam's Club. Since they put their Black Friday deals online at 11:00 pm Wednesday, I was at the keyboard and ordered it a couple of minutes before 11 (as soon as the online price changed to the BF price). Free shipping... it will be here in a day or two. No crowds, no lost sleep, no pepper spray. The joke here is "too bad I didn't have the new tv to fall asleep in front of during the weekend football games". :D
Posted

Went out late BF to Michael's and picked up a 7 1/2 ft pre-lit tree for $199.00 and a pack of thumb tacks for $2.00. I had a coupon for half off 1 item, but didn't know it didn't apply to the tree since it was already marked down $200.00, so my Total savings was $201.00!!

 

Went to Target last night and got the 7pk Disney Princess Dolls for $39.99. I used my Red Card and got 5% off so the total came to just above $40.00. Saved $29.00!!!

Posted

Had a good experience. First time my daughter and godsister went. Was in line at Target at 9:15pm. This year they had barriers up. This was great because last year the late arrivals bumrushed the door and got in first. They handed out 25 tickets for the 46"tv. If you hadn't gotten it by 12:30 then they would sell it. I received ticket 22 out of 25. I was able to score several $1.99 movies and $10 ds games. We were out by 12:30am. Went home and dropped the tv off and then was headed to Walmart.

 

Walmart was bananas. Lines around the entire store. People lined up in customer service waiting til 8am to do layaway. I simply wanted the dual dvd player. Left Walmart and drove 20minutes away to another one in a small town. Got bath mats, kindle fire, $1.97 movies, $19 printer. Went to customer service to see if any dual dvd players, customer service rep said there was one left but she was holding it for herself. I was pissed.

 

Headed to Kohl's and Best Buy but lines were still out the door. Went to local grocery store HEB to score Spiderman and Cars pillow pets buy one for $15 get one free.

 

Got home by 5:00 and immediately went online to see if the dual dvd player was available online at Walmart. It was...got it...with free shipping. Went to bed and was back up and out shopping by 10:00am. Got everything I wanted from Michael's, Home Depot and then we hit the mall. Enjoyed myself but was in bed by 7pm and didn't get up until 7am the next morning.

Posted

stayed up late till the bestbuy online sale started. i got the dell tablet and a nikon camera and some cheap games.

i was very impressed with the croud control at target. arrived @ 3:30 after turkey dinner, by orders of my wife to get that 46" tv "im sick of are old 24" tube set". i was 5th in line beacuse all of the best buy people for the 199 tv found out the store invantory and then headded over to wait at target. i was bummed i usualy am first. So i got the tv, ds games and some girly toys for my DD. and then was in bed at 12:30. i will take that black friday time any day.

Posted

Went to customer service to see if any dual dvd players, customer service rep said there was one left but she was holding it for herself. I was pissed.

What was that rep thinking? Just say they are all gone, don't say we have one left but you can't have it!

Posted
I stayed up until 1:30 Thursday morning waiting for Target to get their Black Friday prices on things I was wanting, online. Then I went to bed (i had given up on them for awhile) and got up around 4, placed my target.com order.....then I finally went back to bed for about two hours, bought one little thing on BestBuy.com and had to get ready for the day. I was very cranky and suffered from lack of sleep (in total, I got maybe 4-5 hours), but I wanted to get my purchases made (I was afraid a few things would not be available, would go out of stock or my size would not be available). I did not get to go to the actual stores. I don't know what I'll do next year as my parents have to host Thanksgiving AGAIN. I preferred when the stores were open at 3 or 4 AM....then my dad dropped me off at 5-6 AM.....and I didn't suffer from a total lack of sleep since I wasn't having to buy everything I could online.
Posted

I was shopping online Thursday, but couldn't buy anything because it was unavailable for shipping. So, I had my hubby go grab Babysitting Mama Wii for $5 after work on Friday. He also grabbed Epic Mickey for $15. I'm still looking around to see if we can get it cheaper. Yesteday, I got online at Best Buy with Free Shipping Harry Potter Years 1-4 for 9.99. I also was able to grab some clothes for our son and 2 daughters from Aeropostale, and Gilly Hicks.

 

*I'm still looking for 2 winter hats w/matching gloves for the girls, pajamas for our boys, 4 wireless nunchuks, rechargeable station for the remotes, and a couple more Wii games.

Posted

Wow! Just received my 24" dynex an wireless printer I ordered from best buy on thanksgiving morning! That was super fast!

 

I do think I am going to do more online shopping next year. The bad stories are starting to disgust me.

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