Our boy Rude Jude just put it down on the Black Friday tip. Stolen directly from his blog (http://rudejude.tumblr.com/). In the spirit of the internet, I'm letting other people's words express how uniquely clever I really am. Thanks Jude.

it's black friday

just a reminder, you don’t have to prove your love to your family by buying them a lot of shit they don’t need and a deal’s not a deal if it puts you in debt. try and avoid paying for christmas well into next year. if you must join this cluster fuck of shopping, and fighting and cutting in lines and being herded around stores like cattle, try and shop from small businesses and buy american and shit like that. me, i haven’t bought gifts for people in years and i’m all the better for it. you won’t see a happier person than me during the holiday season. my kid gets one thing but that’s it and as a matter of fact i think i’m cutting her off in a year too.

i decided on the no gifts thing years back, Asia was 4 or 5 years old, i was dead broke and had to go to the dollar store to get her gifts. man, i felt like shit about it. i felt ashamed that my daughter had to have little cheap ass dollar store presents and to add insult to injury, the dollar store shit was breaking me. i gave her her presents, she didn’t know the difference but i was sitting there dying inside. i said to myself, ‘this is some bullshit. this is christmas, this is the one time a year you’re supposed to feel good. and look at me, I’m sitting here feeling bad about my kid, hoping she doesn’t notice the difference between her gifts from me and the other ones. feeling bad that i didn’t cop shit for the rest of my fam. i spent all my money on gifts and i still feel like shit. i’m not being stressed out for christmas.’ i looked around and saw all my little cousins wildin’ out, opening their shit and as soon as one was opened they tossed their present aside for the next and the next and the next after that. then it hit me. i had one of those, “what have we become” moments, i don’t know if it was excessive shopping or the sheer number of the cousins but it was out of control. i said, “no more. no more buying shit for christmas. this ain’t christmas, i can’t even hear the christmas carols over this gift orgy. fuck feeling bad, fuck buying gifts. i’m done.” and i that was it. i make money now but i still don’t concern myself with presents on xmas, i buy shit for people when i feel like, i give year round so fuck it.

join jude, sit down and have a chat with your family, agree to pare back on christmas spending or ban it all together or even make shit for each other. wouldn’t that be something? making some shit. instead of consuming, you’re creating. me, i’m just gonna show up with some food a bottle of wine and love and spread christmas cheer like AIDS in Africa.