"People screamed."

Presumably not with Xmas glee. The P-I reports...

Extra police were called to a Wal-Mart store in the south Seattle suburb of Renton to help control shoppers who dislocated counters as they rushed into the electronics department after doors opened Friday morning, hunting a limited supply of laptop computers.

There were some officers already at the store, but others were called to help.

At the South Hill Wal-Mart in Puyallup, near Tacoma, a crowd of hundreds was getting edgy by 4:45 a.m. When the doors opened 15 minutes later, shoppers converged on a pile of $378 laptops. People screamed, one witness said.

The General reminds us - there's a reason for the season...