Although Christmas may be more than a month away, the shopping spirit of the holidays has invaded DeKalb's major venues rather early.

Tom Kehrees, store manager of Wal-Mart, 2300 Sycamore Road, said that shopping for the holiday season won't pick up until after Thanksgiving, but that displaying merchandise early puts the consumer in the Christmas spirit.

"The customer may not be ready to buy it, but when they get ready to buy they do remember what they see and where they saw it at," Kehrees said.

Wal-Mart, which began displaying its Christmas items in October, is offering consumers the opportunity to place items on layaway without having to pay a charge.

"I think there is going to be some good pricing out there as the weather turns colder," Kehrees said. "We don't charge. It keeps all the Christmas gifts at Wal-Mart instead of your home."

Kehrees added that because of the economy, stores will be pricing competitively.

"Be a smart shopper, and really look at pricing this year," Kehrees said. "I think it's going to be a very competitive season. We've got warm weather when we're supposed to have cold weather — that really does slow down the sales of the cold weather merchandise."

Diana Channing, store manager of Target, 2555 Sycamore Road, said Target began to position its Christmas merchandise the night after Halloween.

"We go overnight right after Halloween, so when the Halloween stuff sells out we go overnight to put out the Christmas stuff," Channing said. "Basically, when the space that we have for our Halloween merchandise sells out, we have nothing else to put in there. We just put the Christmas merchandise straight in there because it takes quite a while to put it all in."

Not only does Target have to complete the store transformation by Christmas, it also has to do it in about 21 days.

Channing said that while most people shop after Thanksgiving, Target's sales have increased over the past several weeks.

"It seems each year like it's getting earlier and earlier," Channing said. "We've actually started seeing people with Christmas lists within the past two weeks."

While Target does not offer shoppers with a layaway option, customers are allowed to have merchandise held for 24 hours.

Unsure of what the dwindling economy would do to Christmas purchases, Channing said sales are looking bright.

"At first I thought it was going to affect (sales) negatively, but from what I've seen the past couple of weeks, it hasn't been effecting it that much," Channing said.

Consumers will be able to take advantage of the early sales that are being offered by stores, and also will be able to find good product selection by not waiting for the last minute to shop.

"I would probably say to buy early this year," Channing said. "A lot of different retailers have bought down (ordered less) not knowing how the economy is going to be. If they shop early, they can guarantee they are going to get the items they are looking for."

Pete VandenBerg, store manager of K-Mart, 2700 DeKalb Ave., said setting up Christmas merchandise early is common.

"It's pretty normal to set-up right after Halloween," VandenBerg said. "It seems like it's going to be pretty good because they are starting early, as far as Christmas shopping goes."

K-Mart charges a five-dollar service charge for layaway.

Phi Mu Alpha, a professional music and service fraternity, joined forces with NIU's newly-formed chapter of Habitat for Humanity to help build a house for some of DeKalb's less fortunate.

On Oct. 27, members of the Greek organization joined together at the corner of North Fourth Street and Short Avenue to participate in the community service project.

"Although we are a music organization, we're not just restricted to just musical type things, and we want to help out the community any way we can," said Francis David, Phi Mu Alpha philanthropy chair.

Ashley Pearson, NIU Habitat for Humanity campus chapter president, said much of the effort made to construct the house was done by NIU community members.

"The house that they are helping with is called the Huskie house," Pearson said. "The majority of the funds, and the labor for the house, was contributed by NIU students and student groups."

The fraternity helped construct parts of the roof by placing tarpaper and shingles on the house.

"It was a lot of fun knowing that we helped out people who were in need," said Derek Ryan, probationary member of Phi Mu Alpha. "I would encourage anybody to go out and volunteer with the Habitat for Humanity program, no matter what they are involved in, because it's a great opportunity to meet new friends and help people out."

David said that after they finished their part of the project, the fraternity members felt a sense of accomplishment.

"It felt really good," David said. "We know that a family in need is going to live in that house some day, and the fact that we were involved to help provide them that house made us feel real good."

Pearson said Phi Mu Alpha has been a prominent campus organization that has participated meaningfully in the Habitat for Humanity project.

"It was really appreciated," Pearson said. "They had about 30 people out there on rotation. They also had people taking photographs to put on our Web site and their own."

The community service project not only helped a less fortunate family but also brought fraternity members together.

"I thought it was a good way to help out, and it is a good organization," David said. "It was also a means as a group to spend time and work with each other, and that's what builds the brotherhood."

Pearson said that helping to build a home for another family is beneficial.

"It's a great way to do community service," Pearson said. "The families who are getting the house help work on it. All the houses are affordable and decent homes for families in need."

For more information on how to participate in Habitat for Humanity, call 753-3332.

"We will have build dates available all winter where people can come out on a Saturday and donate their time that day to build," Pearson said. "This house should be completed by the spring, and Kishwaukee Valley Habitat for Humanity will be starting another house next spring."

Before they did anything, assistant dean Lenny "Coach" Mandell gave them some advice.

"There are 30 teams," he cautioned. "Don't expect to win. Don't expect anything. Only one team wins. Just have fun."

But if they did come home with the "hardware," he would retire.

On the night before the last day of the three-day long competition, the 2001 NIU law team attended an awards banquet. Awards for the Best Petitioner's Brief, the Best Respondent's Brief and the Best Oralist were given. When they announced that the team from NIU won the Best Petitioner's Brief award, Mandell leaned over to his wife and whispered, "I think we might've won this thing."

And just as they did the other couple of days, they advanced. Greg Brady, Steve Brooks and Christian Sullivan, members of the team, were headed to the final round.

This was not the position that Mandell typically finds his teams in. There usually was an early exit, followed by a congratulatory dinner at the Berghoff restaurant in Chicago. Then they'd go home. But this time, the team had the highest overall brief score, carrying them to the final round.

They were tired and nervous. They ate fast and went back to their hotel room to prepare and maybe get some rest.

"I didn't sleep that night," Brooks said. "Neither did Chris."

In the closest final in its 20-year history, the John Marshall Law School's annual Moot Court Competition in Information Technology and Privacy Law garnered the NIU law team a second-place finish — the highest of any NIU team.

The team lost by 0.07 of a point out of 200. Mandell would have to wait on his retirement.

"We didn't plan on doing very well," Sullivan confessed. "But we did want to write a really good brief, and we did that."

Mandell has been coaching NIU teams in this competition for 12 years.

"Coach told us not to expect anything," Brady said."So when we thought we got our butts kicked in an oral debate, we thought we were done. We'd be ready to go to the bar and get drunk."

But the team kept hearing its name called, Mandell said.

The competition boasted 30 law school teams from the United States and two from Australia. The field included teams from University of Florida, University of Wisconsin, University of Texas, Florida State, Chicago State and many other distinguished schools.

Justices from state and federal courts served as judges, including two justices from the State Supreme Courts of Idaho and Michigan.

"That was awesome," Brooks said. "To argue your case in front a supreme court judge is something that never happens. It's rare for any lawyer."

Year after year, the competition focuses on a technology and privacy issues reported in the news. This year's case required arguments based on the privacy implications of facial recognition technology.

In the case, the plaintiff was photographed at a basketball game and his photograph was used on a billboard in conjunction with a campaign to locate missing children. His wife was a convicted child abductor. He wasn't. He sued for false light invasion of privacy. To place someone in false light is to portray an individual in a way that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person.

"This is a real client in a real case that you actually represent," Mandell said of the mock trial. "It's a great opportunity for them. I told them to be a passionate advocate for your client. To be confident, persuasive and explain and educate the court."

Their winning brief will be published in the John Marshall Journal of Computer and Information Law.

"This a tremendous milestone for our program and the student body," Mandell said.

Brooks agreed.

"Honestly, I was happy to get as far as we got," Brooks said. "It showed that NIU could compete with the top law schools."

The third-year law students wrote and researched the entire brief by themselves. Only two of them were allowed to argue either for the plaintiff or against. Brady argued both ways, because the "courts like him," and Brooks would argue against.

They only had one superstition they cared to talk about.

They each had an Altoid before every argument. Brady had two.

"We had chemistry," Brooks said.

"We are extremely proud of what we did," Brady said. "Hopefully the university is too."