I have officially taken a step forward in life...I bought Calvin Klein underwear

So we went shopping today.  Our first real shopping experience where we didn't have a plan of going to one place to get something specific.  Not only did I take a huge step forward in my life but Christy's lifelong emotional roller coaster has hit a new high.  We went with no real purpose or plan of what we were going to get and she came home with two pair of Seven jeans, one Channel bag, one North Face winter jacket, a pair of comfy Abercrombie pants, a new Nokia blackberry style phone, Ugg boots, five DVD's, Glee Season 1, and a key chain!

I believe she summed up the experience quite well when she exclaimed, "It's like Christmas!!!".  Shopping here is actually kind of fun (if you know me at all, you know that is a huge statement).  If we even slow down in front of a shop they begin the sales pitch.  Of course, since Christy is interested in everything every store is offering, we didn't pass too many without going in.  They would then run around grabbing things and asking "you like?"  If the answer is no they run to get something else to put in your face.  If yes, the real fun begins.

They then give you a price.  Usually on a calculator where they punch in the number they are offering.  That is when we get to act completely disappointed and begin to walk out of the store.  They quickly offer another price and we repeat.  They then give us the calculator and we type in a number that is roughly 60% lower than what they are offering.  Then, it is their turn to act completely exasperated.  Depending on how everything goes we seemed to end up paying between 50 and 60% of their original price.  All in all, when the experience was over I totaled up all of the prices she had paid and it came out to around $270 for EVERYTHING.

I did manage to stop in a few places that actually sold men's clothing and bought myself some new skibbies and 3 new shirts.  The shirts have $72 US price tags and I ended up getting them for $11 US and $2 for each pair of underwear.  We passed the calculator quite a few times and I even put the stuff down and stopped arguing the price which sent the woman into an almost panic as she began shouting out lower price after lower price until she just agreed to what I wanted to pay.  Fun!!!

Although that ended up being quite a deal it doesn't compare to the tight fisted shopping that Christy was able to pull off.  When we walked into the coat store that was full of North Face jackets and coats Christy ended up settling on one rather quickly.  The lady gave her a price of around 1000 yen.  Christy put it down and said NO and began to leave.  The lady said "just for you, new low price" and typed in something around 980 yen.  Christy repeated her original performance and then grabbed the calculator from the lady and typed in 500.  The lady let out a loud sigh and explained to Christy how great of a deal she was giving her at 980.  She basically turned the coat inside out to show her the quality and the stitching and everything about it.  Christy retyped 500.  The lady then said "good for you, not good for me!".  Christy repeated her 500.  This went on for a while until the lady began coming down on her price.  It is at this time when Christy would usually start raising hers to meet in the middle, but she didn't.  The whole process took only a few minutes but without going up at all the lady ended up selling her the coat for 500 yen.  Which is just over $70.  Christy closed the deal by promising to return if she agreed to the price!  Nice job Wifey!

All in all it was actually a fun day of shopping!  My message to all of you reading out there is:

Come Visit...and buy nice new things!

Until next time, best wishes from us!  Keep in touch as much as possible because we love hearing about what is going on in your lives as well.  We miss you all!!!  Take care

The Klumps