The holiday season has officially begun. With the coming of turkey and pumpkin pie to our tables and love handles Black Friday began the first of the holiday deals. People came out in droves to check out the loss leaders from the major retailers-some buyers, many shoppers. For my electronics habit, I was out sampling the electronics deals and steals bright and early. Best Buy was a madhouse. Everywhere else was manageable. It was fun watching people drool over the latest HDTV’s and $2.99 DVD’s. Some prices were so low it’ll be hard to pay regular prices. Call of Duty 2 for $19.99 one day and then back up to $39.99 the next. Some people try to avoid the malls and stores on the day after Thanksgiving. I make it an event.

Technovations has all the latest information on Black Friday deals, their successes and failures, and what this means for the rest of the holiday buying season in consumer electronics. With quick reviews on the Xbox 360 peripheral add-on HD-DVD drive and the Yamaha YT-800 single speaker surround sound powerhouse I’ve been busy updating the sites.

I finally got a chance to see Casino Royale. (Anyone with kids knows how much of a challenge it can be to see a movie while it’s still in theaters.) Man was it good. I hate being so brazen about it being so good tending as it does to ramp up peoples expectations. There are certainly things that could’ve been better, but it is clearly the best Bond film of my generation. Well, clearly since 1978 and perhaps even since Sean Connery left the franchise. I’ll leave the rest of my opinions for the review.

In coming weeks I plan on having quite a lot of fun with holiday parties, ads, and preparing for the upcoming January vacation to Orlando. I’m sure I’ll have more to say on this and many other things as the days click by.