Well, I survived another tax-free weekend. How about you? Typically I’m the type of person who stays away from crowds. I compare Tennessee’s tax-free weekend with Spain’s “running with the bulls.” Not that I’m comparing any of Murfreesboro’s citizens with bulls, mind you, but I think I did call a couple of women heifers.
The only reason I even went out of my house is my wife was out of town, and I promised to at least buy the kids some shoes. No way was I going to commit to buying actual school supplies and get into that mess. But alas, with everything in my life, nothing ever goes to plan.
The shoe shopping went great. We only had to go to nine different stores to find the right style and size. We only had to stand to try on shoes at eight of those nine stores since every place was so packed there was no place to sit. And I only had to go wipe off the toilet seat in the women’s restroom in six of those stores so my daughter could pee. Do all 7-year-old girls have to go that often? Oh, and to the lady I accidentally opened the stall door on, I truly am sorry, and I promise I didn’t see anything I haven’t seen before.
After the shoe shopping, my daughter begged me into taking her to look for a “Kung Fu Panda” backpack. The backpack aisle at the “world’s largest retailer” looked somewhat like the Blackman community after the tornadoes sometime back in the ’90s. I don’t know what that aisle is rated fire marshal-wise, but I suspect there were several more people than allowed by law. On a side note, if you disagreed with the recent report that has Tennessee as the third fattest state, I can honestly say we are definitely a frontrunner in that category.
In that entire store there was one “Kung Fu Panda” backpack. And as I remember the incident my hand was on it first. But before I could get it in my cart, a very large woman, with a haircut like Sgt. Carter from Gomer Pyle, and a tattoo on one arm that said “Men Suck,” and another on the other arm that said “Born to Kill” with her parole date tattooed underneath it, grabbed it from me.
We tugged back and forth for a few minutes until finally she wrestled it away from me.
When I got up off the floor, I immediately went into my “Karate Kid” stance where I stand on one leg and hold my arms out like Mr. Miyagi taught Danielsan to do. Just so you know, if I’m ever physically threatened I always go into some sort of martial arts pose. I only took one semester of karate in college, but I’ve seen enough Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris and Jackie Chan movies to consider myself at least a brown belt.
Since she wasn’t backing down or giving up the backpack, I went ahead with a kick aimed at her midsection. Remember when you were a kid and you tried to kick your big brother and he just grabbed your foot and you had to hop around on one leg until he finally decided to let you go? Well, that’s exactly what happened here. Except unlike a big brother, who would have some mercy, she decided to throw in a groin kick of her own. Long story short, my daughter will be sporting a “Hello Kitty” backpack this year, and I won’t be jogging for quite some time.
And thanks to the security at the store for thinking it would be a good idea to handcuff “Large Marge” and me together until the police got there to sort it all out. Of course I didn’t mind being handcuffed so much until the security guard stepped out and left us alone for what seemed like an eternity. But on the bright side the surgeon says there’s a 50/50 chance the top part of my ear will stay reattached. The bad news is there is a female Mike Tyson out there who now has a taste for human ear.
When all was said and done, my family saved more than $35 by taking advantage of the tax-free weekend. If you add that to the $27 I spent on lunch and the $30 or so I spent in gas traveling to stores I would never normally shop at we saved more than $90. Now that’s some big sav… ooh, wait just a minute. I think my math may be off on this one. Check back with me later on those figures. Maybe around August 2009.
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