At 3 am this morning I hunkered down in front of the local Target, determined to get a Wii or die trying. The ambient temperature was a bit below freezing and there was a wicked breeze whipping around the building from the east, but I held my ground at the number five spot in line.

At 5 am Brunslo showed up to keep me company, which was a good thing because by then my toes were completely numb with cold. He held my spot in line while I went across the street to Starbucks for some life-saving hot chocolate. Toes defrosted, I rejoined the line.

Finally, at 7:30, two Target employees emerged. One guy seemed to be trying to look tough and mean and stood there with his arms crossed, telling people to get into an orderly line, like he was worried we were going to rush the doors or something. I guess he must have been a veteran of the PS3 launch. xkcd was right, though; the Wii-seekers were pretty cool people. The other employee started handing out tickets. He announced that they had 3 or 4 Playstation 3s, and for some reason he assumed that the first few people in line would want them instead of Wiis. I only saw one guy take him up on it. Everyone else, including me, asked for a Wii ticket instead.

With ticket in hand, Brunslo and I retreated to my car, where we defrosted our buttocks on the heated seats and waited for the doors to open at 8:00. A short time later, we emerged victorious with a Wii and several games.

We managed to get in a good three hours of gameplay before I crashed. I think it was worth it.