Buffalo Boy's Blog

Don't take this the wrong way, I like Christmas, I do. I like the lights, Santa, family, friends. Its a time of year that gets you through the darkest, coldest parts of winter, only it seems like the last 10 years or so its gone completely in the other direction. Greed, shelfishness and down right rudeness is the overall vibe.

You want to see what Im talking about? Go to the Best Buy/Target/Barnes and Nobles plaza in Amherst and try negotiating your way through that friggin mess. It was like trying to leave Darien Lake after a rock concert only people weren't in cheery moods or seemingly having a good time.

I recieved no fewer than five middle fingers from drivers in that parking lot because they couldn't go another 50 feet and all I was trying to do was get across a lane to get to another portion of the parking lot and then you have the assholes who won't let you through because they think you are going to get in front of them and so they refuse to budge, never mind that letting you in isn't going to speed things up.

When I left Best Buy, two cars almost hit each other trying to go for my spot at the same time, comical but at the same time disappointing.

Is this really what Christmas has become? Middle fingers, stuffed parking lots with people being rude to each other just because they are trying to negotiate their way through that parking lot. Its over the top. Next year everything I do will be done online and I will only do it through EBay or Amazon.com because I will no longer support these big retail stores that build these massive plazas that ultimately are a safety hazard and only get people more aggitated.

I don't pay any attention to the religious side of Christmas but Im pretty sure that Jesus didn't have the craziness I was witness to in mind yesterday when we celebrate his birthday. Its time to take a step back, maybe stop the midnight and Thanksgiving Day sales that get people hyped up and materialistic about this holiday. Stop making people believe they are getting deals that they will never get again on stuff. It is simply not the case. Christmas has become a holiday for greedy coorporations looking to maximize profit and when they get people like they were yesterday it has totally defeated any meaning this holiday has for me.

Not to mention, that parking lot in that plaza is a safety hazard, if I was having a medical condition.....a heart attack or there was a fire in any one of those stores or a car accident how would any safety or emergency vehicle get through there? Local government should step in and force those stores to come up with a plan to decrease traffic flow during their busiest season or knock some of them down and relocate to better areas that can handle the traffic flow and make that whole area safer for shoppers and maybe, just maybe the Christmas spirit would return.

A word of advice: Slow down, be nice, let people into traffic and don't be so greedy and shelfish around a holiday that is supposed to mean the opposite