Yesterday was Black Friday. For all the wild shoppers out there, that means a cold, sleepless night of bargain shopping, wristband snagging, killer sales deals galore. For most of us, its that day we sleep off the Thanksgiving feast stupor.

Early in the week, my sister-in-law (hereafter referred to as SIL) asked me if I wanted to go out with her at midnight Thursday to do a little Black Friday shopping. I laughed. Seriously. I’m all for shopping -and am always up at midnight. But Black Friday? Isn’t that the traditional trampling-shoppers-day? Um, no thank you. But then she started quoting deals. iPods, Rock Band (the Leggo version, no less!), dolls and toys and clothes. Suddenly there were a million things NOT on my gift-buying list that I just had to have.

So I quit laughing and told SIL maybe.

She called Thursday night to see if I was ready to rock. I was actually in the middle of making a pie (we celebrated Thanksgiving on Friday since there were so many demands for everyone’s time on Thursday), but stopped crimping the crust to flip through the ads and talk bargains. There were tons. But as usual, time and sanity had cooled my impulse-shopping-jets.

I looked at the ads. I looked at my half-crimped-crusted pie. And It told my SIL I was going to skip the wild and crazy times of Black Friday shopping.

What stopped me? The only thing I was really REALLY tempted to brave the chilly air, crowds and credit card shock on… it was for myself. Hey, that new iPod Touch is awesome! But after long consideration (at least a minute) I decided to stay home and finish making the pie, then reward myself by curling up on the couch to read (Better Naughty Than Nice – its on shelves now!) and relax. But I did put that iPod Touch on my birthday list…

So how about you? Are you the brave-the-crowds-for-a-bargain kind of gal? Or an early shopper, scoff-at-the-idea-of-Black-Friday type? Or maybe you really like to live on the edge and start all your shopping in mid-December??