Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Christmas music at Kmart

It was weird enough seeing the racks of discounted leftover Halloween costumes and other Halloween items on the sidewalk at Kmart today. Is anyone actually buying that stuff nearly three weeks after the fact? I, for one, am not gonna decide on a Halloween identity for next year till August at the earliest, though I might do so earlier than that. But I'm still not ready to think about Christmas and have only minimal plans for Thanksgiving next week. Some family and I are planning to go out to dinner and to a movie that will open that day. And of course, I knew once I got into the store the Christmas stuff would be everywhere.

But I was a bit shocked to hear Christmas music over the store intercom. A Christmas tune by Elvis came on the intercom as I was exploring the display of 2011 calendars, one of the things I need to get over the next two months. I don't know when Kmart started playing the Christmas music as I can't remember exactly when I last entered the store, other than on Halloween eve.


My work's intercom hasn't started their day-long stream of Christmas music yet and I'm hoping when I go back tomorrow that it won't start then as it did last year, exactly one week before Thanksgiving last year. If that happens, then I feel that I have free rein to listen to my own Christmas CDs at home before turkey day is over. It is only one week from tomorrow.

So far Kmart is the only store at which I have heard any Christmas music over the intercom as of today. I also made runs to Target and to Safeway today and heard no Christmas music on the intercoms, just the displays of Christmas merchandise that have likely been coming in since September. A listening kiosk of Christmas music CDs has been at Target and I passed by it, hearing a sample. I didn't press any of the buttons and did not see any other customer do it, so I do not know how this happened. And I know I was not imagining it either. I'll admit I did try this display on a previous trip to Target earlier this month, however.

1 comment:

Stephanie Faris said...

I went to the mall last weekend to return a couple of things and the whole place was brimming with Christmas. Same thing at the grocery store. It seems early -- do we even celebrate Thanksgiving anymore? We just breeze right through it.