Happy Thanksgiving, Keep Your Black Friday

I'd like to wish all of my faithful readers a happy Thanksgiving...and a sense of perspective about the consumer frenzy known as Black Friday.  Only it seems now that Black Friday has seeped deeply into Thursday and now thoroughly impinges on what once used to be a major holiday.  Amassing "stuff" isn't on my list of priorities in life, although I have certain things I want to buy as well (or receive as gifts).  I more highly value time, both in a relaxed setting with my family and in a more reclusive sense as I study and meditate.  Material possessions are O.K., but I already have enough of just about anything I need.  It looks as if most other people have enough, too, but they are restless to "upgrade" to the latest gizmos being churned out for consumption.  So this purchasing frenzy, as I see it, is not transformational in nature but rather marginal and compulsive.  There is too much effort being spent to gain too little of an improvement.  Also, I suspect that many people caught up in this shopping insanity are behaving like herd animals, just following whatever they perceive the others are doing in order to "fit in".  What a sad way to live a life...