MALL-PHOBIA & ONLINE SHOPPING

I don't like THE MALL. I get a panic attack just thinking about having to shop at THE MALL. I have always avoided them. Always hated them. Always found another reason to NOT go to THE MALL.

I don't "go to the mall", "look at the mall", "grab it at the mall", "walk the mall", "meet at the mall", "see it at the mall", "find it at the mall", etc. I just can't make myself go into one. I'm sure it's something I should talk to a therapist about, but I'm pretty content just avoiding them. I manage without them.

I've never known anyone who hated THE MALL as much as I do.

They're crowded, they have too much to offer, they smell weird, they have too many entrances and exits, they don't have enough entrances and exits, they're too spread out (I'm on the north end, I need to be on the south end, but I have to walk through the west side to get to the south end, oh, but I guess the car is on the east side). Just too, too, much thinking and planning.

I'm more of an "I'm just going to run in and grab it" sort of person. The Dollar Store, The Container Store, Barnes and Noble, work just fine for me. Oh, and Target. OMG, Target. I could write pages and pages about how much I love Target.

But what I really love, I mean REALLY, REALLY love is Amazon. I can get everything I need on Amazon.  Or at least I haven't found anything that I CAN'T get on Amazon. Well, except for grocery store sorts of things. I still need the grocery store - not the "can buy a lawnmower at the grocery store" sort of grocery store, but the basic grocery store. I don't want to buy ground chuck or tampons on Amazon.  AND, it gets delivered right to your front door!!!!

You can buy a book or 12,000 books; you can get a butter dish or silver service for a hundred; you can get a camera or a coloring book; you can get a dog bed or a stuffed elk head to hang on your wall, you can get a TV or an etch-a-sketch, or you can order a self-help CD to help teach you how to deal with your phobia of THE MALL ..... all on Amazon.

Well, I ordered a book for a friend recently on Amazon. Just one book, for a gift, the size of a magazine, just one book. Here is how it arrived.


They could have put a dozen books in this box. They could have put a set of dishes in this box, they could have put a wedding dress in this box. But they put ONE book in the box, which of course needed all the blow-up floaties that they use now as padding. Don't they have an envelope for just one book??

I'm sure the person who filled my order was just trying to go out for a beer or go to a soccer game, and maybe they were out of the "one book" packages. I'm hopeful. But I think the title of the book is pretty funny considering the over-packaging they took to ship it. And FYI - I did NOT make this up!!

So, anyway, I still hate THE MALL. And I still love Amazon. But I'm going to put in a phone call to my friends there in the shipping department.

And who would have thought that I had so much to say about this topic. Hum.