Here’s what I ended up getting:

Stargate – The Ark of Truth: I debated on getting a full season of Stargate SG-1 that I didn’t have, but this was newer and not on TV yet. Decent for what’s really a two-part episode, though for the cost I think I’d rather have a season of SG-1 or even Atlantis (which were on sale for a few dollars more).

Logitech PlayStation 2 Cordless Action Controller: I don’t have a lot of time to play video games these days, but when I do it is a must to not have cords on the floor with the kids running around. Plus my couch isn’t all that close to the TV. I’ve had one of these controllers for a few months and just love it and decided to add a second one to replace my old (too-small-for-my-big-fat-hands) controller. And as a bonus, these have great battery life and they come with real batteries (Duracell), not some no-name junk.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08: As I said, I don’t have a lot of time to play video games…I’ve got a house full of kids and am now running two businesses. So games that I play must be short and have a definitive end to them (I started a game of Ratchet & Clank probably four years ago and am not done…and probably never will be). For that reason, I like to stick to sports games (other than football). The only golf game I had was an old “Hot Shots” (which isn’t all that great), but I’ve played Tiger Woods 07 on my friend’s Wii and loved it so I decided to give the PS2 version a whirl. This one won’t get old any time soon.

So there you have it. And for those of you who gave me the gift cards, thanks!

The purchases this year were pretty simple, as I wasn’t after any “big ticket” items or even toys for that matter…

Office Max…I picked up a memory card, some CD-R’s, some pens and most importantly, Norton Internet Security 2008. Savings…well over $100. And they started the online sales on Thursday, which as a bonus.

Circuit City…DVD’s, DVD’s and more DVD’s. They had an amazing sale on DVD’s and all I can say is that maybe the huge discounts are related to the fact the HD-DVD and Blu-ray discs are starting to roll out pretty heavily. But DVD quality beats VHS by far and I don’t own a HDTV, so I’m a happy shopper. I am a little surprised that they offered so many online, but man was that much easier than hunting them down in the store. Savings…I can’t give a good estimate, but it was a lot.

Target…two DVD’s at $3.98 each. I actually had my brother-in-law pick these up. Savings…probably $18-20 or so based on retail prices.

So I’m happy how this worked out and will probably try to do my shopping online for what little shopping I have left to do. I did that one year and it is truly amazing and so much easier. Order, pay, check the mail, wrap, give away. But I still like to buy clothes in person as I can’t get a good grasp on what I’m buying online. Plus, doesn’t the feel of the fabric make a huge impact on the buy or don’t buy decision?

It’s not that I’m overly paranoid that the Chinese are out to kill and/or harm us all, but it is certainly a concern. Especially since it appears that every toy that is/was made in China toy is being recalled, but they’re just taking it in stages. (Is that paranoid or make me sound like some conspiracy nut?) And who has the time to purchase toys that have to be returned? Can you even imagine how much worse the exchange lines will be after Christmas this year if this continues?

So we looked through all of the kids current toys and haven’t found much of anything that isn’t made in China (and good luck finding many “Made in the USA” toys at the major retailers). And this also includes all of the “kids meal” related toys for the various fast food restaurants.

So this has lead to the start of yet another Surge Bucket Media blog, Just Not China, which will showcase products that you can buy that are indeed, “Not Made in China”. (If someone has a positive phrasing idea for that, please let me know.) While there are a few major companies that we hope to get on board, the vast majority of the products will not be available many places beyond online websites and catalog sales. But that is great as you’ll be helping the “little man” and be purchasing products that most people don’t even know about.

We quickly put this up today, based on this blog’s theme, so bear with us as it gets built out and products are listed. It may take a few weeks to get rolling, but we hope to have some products listed well before Christmas. So please bookmark the site and subscribe to the RSS feed. And if you have anything to add, please contact us.

Here’s the list (and it’ll be updated as other sites pop up)…

• Black Friday 2007 – [RSS Feed]
• BlackFriday.info – [RSS Feed]
• Black-Friday.net
• Black Friday Ads – [Mobile Version | RSS Feed]
• Black Friday @ GottaDeal.com – [Mobile Version | RSS Feed]
• DaddyODeals
• DealsPl.us – [RSS Feed]
• DealTaker Official Black Friday 2007 Ads
• TheBlackFriday.com

If you know of any sites that I don’t have listed, please let me know.

Related, Wal-Mart has already started the “deal wars”, so it’s likely that you’ll be able to snag some good sales before the “official” Christmas shopping season.

Be the talk of the Christmas season by sporting Future Karnies of America Christmas Apparel!

Anyway, we had our usual hit list of places to go just in case they had something we were interested in, and this year all four places we went had what we wanted…and that’s a first.

Stop 1 was Office Max at 5am. I picked up a memory card for my camera and a few small items. Small crowd of people, which was good since the sale item were not marked and for some reason checkout was a bit slow.

Stop 2 was Best Buy around 5:15am. As always, I have no idea why we go there, but we usually do and it is always your best bet for a crowd since the guys and the ladies love the place. We picked up a few DVDs and stood in the checkout line for about an hour, which was better than the hour and a half or so that we stood in line last year, but my guess is that a lot of people didn’t realize that they opened at 5am this year instead of the usual 6am in previous years.

Stop 3 was Target around 6:30am. A little busy, but not bad at all and they had the few things that we wanted. There were maybe three people in front of us in line. This was much better than previous years.

Stop 4 was Radio Shack around 6:50am. I picked up a headset to use with Skype
and a new pair of headphones for the podcast since my old ones shorted out on me. Pretty empty and no line at all.

We were on the road and headed home around 7am, just in time to beat the sun up.

The only usual stop that we didn’t make this year was Menards, but they didn’t have much of interest and there’s never much of a crowd there.

Now I need to get the kids down for a nap sometime this morning so I can get a short nap in myself. I’m so tired that I spaced the need of a coffee filter to brew a pot of coffee and had to clean that mess up and start over. And we’ve got a long night of Karnie Christmas II planning and writing in store, so the sleep will be much needed.

• Black Friday @ GottaDeal.com
• Black Friday 2006 — The folks are using the Watershed Studio WordPress Email Notification Plugin
• Black Friday Ads — [PDFs]

If you want to see the PDFs I’d suggest getting them now since some stores are demanding that they be removed (like Best Buy). Ah, the joys of Christmastime are lingering in the air…

When I saw the ICarta Stereo Dock for iPod with Bath Tissue Holder in a newspaper ad I thought that it had to be a joke, but sure enough someone has came up with the idea to allow people to dock their iPod close to the toilet. Brilliant! What a great way to get people to pay even more money to place their iPod only a few inches away from where it really belongs. Oh, the irony.