This is where I spent my Thanksgiving this year while in Omaha, it's the Ed Zorinsky Lake. It's another one of the beautiful open green spaces Nebraska has to offer. The park is public land, including 190 acres dedicated to wildlife management. The park is home to the Bauermeister Prairie, which houses 120 species of plants, birds and wildlife.
The park has two modern playgrounds, several playing fields, baseball diamonds, soccer field, "football field", hiking trails, cycling trails, barbecues and sheltered spaces. This park is pretty much the perfect place for a family to spend the day, you can even go fishing or boating on the lake using the boat ramp provided.
And this brings me nicely on to the subject of this weeks blog.
Thanksgiving in America, pretty similar to the harvest festivals you may remember from your childhood, but as usual it has added US fan fair. Families and neighbours come together to share food, good times and in the olden days, to give thanks for a good harvest. It seems to have a neighbourly spirit only seen in the UK around Christmas time, but it doesn't have the consumerist related drive that Christmas does.
Unfortunately, this utopian dream ends in spectacular fashion only 24 hours after the celebration of Thanksgiving. This pure and righteous day is superseded by what is know as "Black Friday"....
I can only describe "Black Friday", as full contact shopping!
We've all seen those crazy people who camp out days before the boxing day sales back in the UK, they live on cardboard rations, enduring sub-zero temperatures all in the vain hope of getting the latest Davina McCall work out DVD for a knocked down price. Now, just for a second imagine arming them with knives, pepper spray and semi-automatic firearms. If you're imaging something resembling a post-apocolyptic scramble for survival, then you're getting close to the realisation of "Black Friday".
Don't believe me, just search "Black Friday" on YouTube.
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