Those days of old, when anxious gift-shoppers stormed the retail battlements for the best discounts on the actual “Black Friday” (that is, the day after Thanksgiving), are not what they once were. A listing of numerous Hawaii Black Friday deals showed some of them starting on a Friday, sure — but last Friday, Nov. 22.

Of course, this is in sync with the fact that store decorations morph from witches and skeletons to Santa Claus as soon as the calendar pages over to November. Sometimes even sooner.