A Christmas Story: Four Frigging Malls (458 hits)
Category: GeneralRating: 0.9 on 12 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Grownasskid (View user info) at 2007-12-26 13:27:19 EST
In my little corner of the world, there are four malls.
I'm not talking strip malls or shopping plazas; there are four separate enclosed shopping structures in my town, each one roughly the size of a military base and full of all the standard mall trappings. The all have the same core stores that one would find in any mall anyplace in the country. Places like Macy's, Sears, Spencer's Gifts, Hot Topic, FYI and Sabarro, which is my favorite pizza place that exists exclusively in malls and thru-way rest stops.
Despite the uniformity that is pretty much inherent for malls in general, the four in my town each have its own distinct personality, like four brothers who all have different interests.
There is the Stabbing Mall, named so for a criminal who used to stalk the parking lot. He would hide under cars and slash people's ankles as they came back from an afternoon of shopping. Coincidently, the Stabbing Mall is usually the least occupied mall. It's a shame, really, seeing that it's the most conveniently located of the four malls. However, because it is so badly attended and poorly maintained, the Stabbing Mall parking lot is a great place for high school kids to go at night to grope at each other.
When people stopped going to the Stabbing Mall, the foot traffic at the Gangsta Mall skyrocketed. Because the Gangsta Mall is located in a section of town that is somewhat socio-economically imbalanced to the rest of the city (read: dirt poor), it attracts a lot of people who are struggling to get by. It also attracts a good amount of gang members, who have on occasion used the tile floors and florescent lights of the mall as an arena for gang wars. I once watched 15 kids converge on 4 unsuspecting youths, only to see the whole thing disperse when the gun-wielding mall security came huffing around the corner.
To it's credit, the Gangsta Mall also has a Panda Express, so it isn't all bad.
Then there is the Huge Mall. You can guess how this one got its name. Spilling across not one, but two four lane roads, the Huge Mall is a consumer monolith; the flag ship for urban sprawl. The downside to this beast is that it's nearly impossible to navigate. The mall maps are few and far between, and as cryptic and hard to decipher as the New York subway system. The obvious upside to this mall is that it's got every fucking thing you can imagine, including two Boarders bookstores and no less than five hot pretzel stores.
Finally, nestled in the high hills of the most affluent suburbs in the county, sits the king of shopping centers, the mall on the hill, the Fancy Mall.
The Fancy Mall is our local attempt at cosmopolitan living, our little slice of Manhattan living in semi-rural bumblefuck. The Fancy Mall has got all the same stores as the other three, with some classy additions like Crabtree and Evelyn, New York and Co, French Connection, Sharper Image and Brookstone and store named Coach, which contains only a handful of purses that cost more than a week's pay. The Fancy Mall doesn't have a food court, it has a "fine dining center." It offers valet parking and has two bistros, just in case all that spending tires you out and you need a mochachino to pick yourself up.
While the other malls are full of normal folk going about their day, the Fancy Mall seems to be more of a social beacon than shopping center. The other three malls have people in sweat pants and dirty t-shirts, but I've never seen anyone dress that casually in the Fancy Mall. Its patrons seem to consists solely of tanned high school beauty queens with two cell phones a peice, well dressed college boys with blonde tips and starch shirts, and well groomed trophy wives looking for designer tops and a chance to flirt with attractive boys behind the registers.
The Fancy Mall is about as swanky as a mall can get. However, there is one unusual tick about the place. Unlike the other malls, the Fancy Mall is full of people giving out free samples. Every third store has drones standing outside, offering coupons, samples, and fliers about upcoming sales. In one five minute stretch, I was given two coupons for 20% of makeup, a flier about a two-for-one biscotte at the bistro, and a free cologne sample given to me by a shirtless, hairless model wannabe outside of an Abercrombie and Fitch.
It's for this reason that I hate the Fancy Mall. I don't mind the shallow, appearance first mentality of the patrons, or the inconvenient drive to get to the mall, or the faux-boheimen stores that exist within the walls of the place. I just don't like being bothered while I'm doing my Christmas shopping. I usually avoid the place at all costs. However, when my quest for the perfect gift for my girlfriend put me in the path of the Fancy Mall, i knew that I would have to devise a plan to beat the Mall, lest I be politely harassed the entire time.
User Reviews
Submitted by TheDoctor (user info) at 2007-12-28 11:07:42 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by monkeyswithguns (user info) at 2007-12-27 14:05:15 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2007-12-26 14:06:23 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
I avoid the two shopping malls in my city at all costs. Not because they're crime-ridden, just simply because I hate fighting the crowds. And I prefer to patronise small business owners.
Submitted by kuroneko_sama (user info) at 2007-12-27 00:42:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
i have 3 decent malls and 2 shitty ones near me, unfortunately each one consists of stores that the others dont so depending on the type of shopping you need to do, you gotta pick and choose. though the rockingham mall in salem seems to be the most well rounded, i usually end up in the mall of NH even though its 1 story, its about as big storewise as many 2 story malls, but not too big you cant get what you need witohut 9 hours of hiking
the giant mall in MA i only go to when im about to do some christmas shopping
shit, now i crave orange julius
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2007-12-26 15:11:12 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Hey...Shlongy lived in Rochester for 39 years.
Who the fuck are you?
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2007-12-26 14:46:32 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Malls within a half hour of me:
Garden State
Bergen Mall
Willowbrook Mall
Short Hills Mall
Palisades Mall
Fashion Center
Riverside Mall
Paramus Park Mall
West New York Mall
Xanadu
Probably some others too.
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2007-12-26 14:06:23 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
I avoid the two shopping malls in my city at all costs. Not because they're crime-ridden, just simply because I hate fighting the crowds. And I prefer to patronise small business owners.
Submitted by Grownasskid (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:49:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:34:19 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
There are two malls within a 10 minute drive of me. This happened at one of them:
http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/mass/sylvia_seegrist/index.html
20 minutes away is a third one, which is the second largest mall in the country, from what I understand- it's actually 2 malls-in-one, the regular mall and the Fancy Mall, connected by a walkway.
I managed to get all my shopping done without setting foot into any of them.
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I've been to that 2nd largest mall. I once got lost in there for about 20 minutes. Too fucking big.
And yes, this is based on something that happened to me in Rochester.
Submitted by MudWhistle (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:45:25 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
All of our malls are measured by the level of snootyness that exudes from their patrons
Submitted by FALLEN (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:45:06 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Yep!
I shoulda been a detective.
Marketplace mall
Eastview mall
The mall at Greece Ridge center
Irondequoit mall.
Fallen,
Private Dick.
Submitted by missflibble (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:35:18 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I like.
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:34:19 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
There are two malls within a 10 minute drive of me. This happened at one of them:
http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/mass/sylvia_seegrist/index.html
20 minutes away is a third one, which is the second largest mall in the country, from what I understand- it's actually 2 malls-in-one, the regular mall and the Fancy Mall, connected by a walkway.
I managed to get all my shopping done without setting foot into any of them.
Submitted by FALLEN (user info) at 2007-12-26 13:31:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Rochester NY?