AUBURN — Oh, the humanity!

Bargain hunters wasted no time at all this year getting Black Friday off the ground. Just one minute after midnight, shoppers swept into the stores of Auburn’s shopping district like a tidal wave in an ocean of savings.

For some who had waited more than eight hours, it was over in a matter of minutes. By 12:05 a.m., many were already spilling out of the stores, triumphantly hauling gigantic televisions and other items across the lot.

For those few, the shopping frenzy was brief. They came early, toughed out the slow tick of time, and came away with the loot they had sought.

For others, it was only just beginning.

The lines at stores like Wal-Mart and Best Buy were long for most of the day. Some came as early at 3 p.m. and grabbed spots close to the doors. By 8 p.m., the scene began to look more like the early stages of a rock and roll show than a shopping expedition.

At Best Buy, a line of people snaked along the front of the building, wound around a corner and continued down the longest side of the building.

At Wal-Mart, just up the hill, the mob was equally impressive. There, a thrashing knot of men, women and kids stretched all the way to the doors of Lowe’s hundreds of yards away.

Kmart, which also opened at midnight, drew a healthy crowd, as well. When the clock struck eight, there were at least two dozen people milling around the front of the building, while others waited in their cars, trucks and SUVs.

They waited. And waited. At Wal-Mart, a few had brought lawnchairs and blankets. Others simply stood, talking with one another or poking at cell phones and tablets. More sat in their cars, running the heaters and waiting for zero hour.

When it came, things happened fast.

At Wal-Mart, clerks stationed at the front of the store began letting the first customers inside. The line behind them began to move as eager shoppers shuffled forward. The dozens of people inside the store became hundreds and then several hundred. Even as they swarmed the aisles, more people were driving into the parking lot, arriving late but still hoping that some bargains remained.

“Oh, this is fun,” said Carla Pray, a Mechanic Falls woman who came with her sister, daughter and grandchildren. “It’s Black Friday. It’s an experience watching all these people.”

Pray was near the end of the line, closer to the doors of Lowe’s. By the time she got inside Wal-Mart, people were already spilling out — the lucky few who had come for the 40-inch televisions marked down to just $179.

Inside the store, the aisles filled up fast. A note for next year: If you don’t need anything in the electronics department, avoid that area altogether.

If there was any disorder at all inside Wal-Mart, it was in electronics. There, people were jammed so closely together, some of them stumbled into display racks. There were a few grumbles and glares, a few dropped items, but mostly just the frenzied bid for great cell phone deals and any shiny gadgets left on the shelves.

Not that other areas of the store were serene. All over it was a mad rush as shoppers clawed through baskets of sale items, grabbing up sheet sets, appliances, toys and clothes as though they were the last drops of water in a drought-ravaged village.

Shopping carts clanged together as people steered them too quickly around corners. Some spoke frantically into their phones, trying to coordinate with shopping partners on the best strategy for getting at the hottest deals.

For many, it was a desperate bid to get the most bang possible for their buck. For others, it was just an excursion.

Pray, for one, wasn’t sweating it.

“We’ve made a night out of it,” she said. “We went to see “Red Dawn” so we’re just getting here. My daughter’s doing her Christmas shopping. My sister will get all of her shopping done.”

Like the rest of the mob, Pray seemed oblivious to the clock — at a time when most people are in bed, things in Auburn were just starting to get interesting.

“Right after we get out of here, we’ll go to all the other stores,” she said. “We won’t get home until 2 a.m. And my daughter has to work at 5.”

At Best Buy, the parking lot was still full at 12:30 a.m. Shoppers filled every aisle.

Across Mount Auburn Avenue, the scene was repeated at Kohl’s, where customers grabbed for clothing, jewelery and housewares rather than digital cameras, video games and home theaters. With fewer cash registers, lines grew long almost immediately. For the most part, shoppers waited patiently, clutching their vacuum cleaners and coffee makers while clerks jabbed feverishly at the register keys.

Some shoppers said they would pull all-nighters, drinking as much coffee as necessary to stay awake and alert for savings. Having planned this for weeks, some had visited the stores early, memorizing the layouts to best optimize their time.

The wait was long, but most agreed that the savings — available only on the magical date known as Black Friday — made the long lines, weird hours and chilly air worth it.

Although, Pray had a suggestion. Perhaps, she said, Maine could join the 47 other states that allowed the shopping spree to get underway on Thanksgiving rather than make them wait until the morning after.

“We wouldn’t mind,” she said, “starting at 10 o’clock instead of midnight.”