Shopping Rant

I am a fabulous shopper but a shocking consumer. I will happily wander around a shopping centre for hours and be perfectly satisfied if I leave with a mere hair tie as long as it was exactly what I was looking for at exactly the right price and only if the shop assistant didn’t piss me off. I very rarely buy for the sake of buying and I will state with confidence that I will never be talked into something by a shop assistant. Ever. There is nothing in the world that irritates me more than that horrible small talk they insist upon, asking how my day is and following me around throwing coat hangers in my face. I also can’t stand it if they ask me ten million times how I am going when I am in the change room. Chances are that I am naked and struggling into a dress while checking out how much worse my cellulite looks in this mirror so please just ask if I am okay once then leave me alone! I don’t know you and I don’t want to talk to you while I am in this delicate state. And I LOATHE IT when they hang around outside the change room and upon your emergence jump all over you exclaiming how cute you look. Cute. I am 24 years old. I am a little beyond wanting to look cute and a lot beyond wanting to hear that I look cute from a 17 year old on prosaic. The reason I am writing this piece today is that I have discovered several lovely stores in my area with fabulous clothes, wonderful sales assistants and like minded customers who understand that playing dress up in a clothing store is not on. I had a little epiphany today when I realised that there are a few glaringly obvious similarities with all of these stores. Not one of them is located inside a mall and all of them are independently owned by real life people. Enough said. I am hereby limiting my mall shopping to Borders and Big W. The rest of my shopping will be done on the Internet (Ebay and Etsy), at little clothing boutiques near car dealerships and of course St Vinnies. And if I feel strong enough to push through the gaggle of uniformed school girls in Diva I think the occasional accessories  run would be acceptable…