Is it just me, or are today's shopping centers so confusing, you have to leave a trail of breadcrumbs to find your way out again?
I suspect the reason you see so many elderly people sitting on shopping centre benches, is not because they love to shop, it's because they went n when they were young, got lost and now live in KMart and Target.
In fact, I think I smell a TV show - Survivor Doncaster. Your challenge today is to avoid being stopped by any of the mobile phone sales people.
OK the problem with my local shopping centre, is that I can never find my car, when I've finished. I really need to carry a NAVMAN just to find the bloody thing when I've finished shopping.
I swear they rotate the shopping centre just after I walk in the automatic doors. And I'm convinced the car park levels whirl around on some sort of a rotisserie.
And of course, there are no clocks. I renember the old days where the only thing you had to take with you when shopping in a mall, was a credit card, oh or cash. But now you need a comass, trail mix and, of course, a sherpa. By the way, the only instance where you'll ever see the time in a mall, other than you wearng a watch, is when you try to buy one. Be prepared, however, they're all set to London time or New York time or Hemmer time!
But all that said, there's something completely compelling about a proper shoppng centre. It's an experience.
I'll never forget when the first big shopping centre opened in the country town I grew up in. For the first few years of my life, if mum or dad wanted to buy anything, they would go to different shops in different places. But all that changed with the opening of the new wiz bang shopping center.
The family was so excited when it opened. Thirty years lated, I still remember the TV adverts promoting it. "Where it's always 21 degrees and fine".
You know the place hasn't got much going for it, when the best thing they can come up with to promote it was "we have air conditioning". I can still remember a hardware store that was promoting "we have doors you can walk in and out of".
We've come a long way, I think.
To change the subject, we're driving to Sydney and I asked them to stop the car so I could go to the bank.
Now is it just me thinking this? Did the person who came up with the name 'banker' get the first letter wrong?
Before I'm beaten to death with the 'next teller please' sign, I should clarify that I am not talking about the humble bank staff here - I realise that working in bank is like working in a strip club , you get to stare at the good stuff, but you can't take it home
Thanks for reading. More about this next month.
