My friend has gotten a job at Macy’s to tide him over until his teaching position starts in the Spring. He logged his experiences working Black Friday.

• Blind Prophecy » Tales of Black Friday

I started writing a comment, but it got so long that I thought it might be more polite to post it here:

I worked Black Friday for seven years in a row when I put myself through college. I was at K-Mart. It’s nice to know that the rich people who shop at Macy’s are just as rude as the plebs that shop at K-Mart.

BTW, the reason they don’t pick up the upper sweaters to get theirs is because their HANDS ARE FULL. That sort of display is ALWAYS going to be messy, but if it wasn’t, they wouldn’t need to pay you to keep it neat.

Oh, those six days you have scheduled off? They’re going to call you in at least once. After today, some of the Christmas help will not come back. They just won’t show up when they were supposed to. If you’re reliable, they’ll give you more hours than you could possibly work and you’ll dread the phone. Luckily, there’s call waiting.

It has been 15 years since I worked Black Friday and I still have scars from it. I NEVER shop the door busters. I find them the embarrassment of humanity. I wish I could forget the year that a riot broke out with fighting for seven dollar blankets. Women pushing and grabbing. The pallet was empty within seconds.

Honestly, sometimes I miss it. Working 80 hour weeks with crabby Christmas shoppers sounds like hell, but part of it was fun. I never fully get into the Christmas mood as I did those years that I worked retail. As difficult as it was, having Christmas thrown in my face every day really made me appreciate those few hours of the day when the store was closed and I could be with my family.