With 2014 almost over, another holiday shopping season is drawing to a close. The looming question on everyone’s mind, of course, is whether holiday sales managed to live up to the (mostly) positive holiday forecasts from analysts and retail organizations.

As I mentioned in a previous column in Retail Rap, Black Friday landed with a resounding thud, failing to meet expectations and surprising most observers with underwhelming numbers. Given the fact that we didn’t see what we expected on Black Friday (and that the weeks since have been decent, but not remarkable), it seems like our post-season analysis will discover that the last week before Christmas—particularly the last pre-Christmas shopping weekend—will have been enormously important, and ultimately defining.

In this edition of Retail Rap, I discuss things that caught my eye during the holiday shopping season that I found particularly interesting, including discount dynamics, sector surprises, department storing and more.