I got a phone survey asking how many times I visit the local mall

[Glenda]

the mall is just a few miles from my place.

She asked if I could answer a shopping survey and I said ok.

She asked: "How often do you visit the ____ mall?"
I told her "every 3 months."
She: "Um. You mean 4 times a year?"
Me: "Yes."
She: "Oh, ok. That's all then. Bye."

I must not have met the criteria. Hee hee!

[lpbk2713]

1. She wouldn't like me at all then.

I haven't been to my local mall (about five miles from my house) in several years. Too congested, trendy, and overpriced.

[Glenda]

2. I can't believe how many people still flock to malls

I mean, when you can compare prices and buy things online, and not have the crowds.

Maybe people get an adrenaline rush in crowds. Me? I get anxious and annoyed.

[DemBones DemBones]

3. Heh heh, I'd have had to say "Well, I was there two

years ago. Or was it three?"

Actually, the old mall here was razed and then they built an updated shopping center, with stores connected only by proximity and shared parking lots, and I have been to the arts and crafts store there twice to buy some art supplies. There's a Barnes & Noble I'll eventually visit, too. But I now see no need to go to the new mall (now about fifteen years old.) Since I'm disabled, it's much easier for me to shop online and I have good luck with it. If women's clothes had standardized sizing it would be more efficient but even when you have to pay to return things that don't fit, I don't think it costs more than the gasoline and inevitable lunch out costs of a shopping trip to the malls, plus the parking meter costs if you want to shop or eat downtown. And trying on clothes at home beats the hell out of any dressing room. I even buy shoes online.

I used to like shopping and do it all the time, but I used to like carnival rides, too.

[Kenneth ken]

4. Malls

Has anyone else noticed that the old-style malls are becoming passe? The Mall used to be a large building with lots of stores 'all under one roof' where one could park, go inside walk around and visit dozens of stores.

I used to think it was just a coincidence that all these big-box stores were located near each other. Then I watched one go up near me. This large vacant area, got filled with Target, B&N, Linens & Things, Pier One, Sportsmen's Warehouse, and a bunch of others. They all were built within a year or so. Like the old department stores that anchored old-style Malls, the new-style malls have a mix of big-box stores, and the 'boutique' type stores, smaller, but nestled in amongst the anchors because, since you're in the area, you might as well stop in here too.

The new-style Mall allows people to be even lazier. Now, dozens of stores go up all within close proximity to each other, not under one roof, but near, so rather than walking, one can drive 30 yards from one store to the other, and shop without the bother of so much walking.

[Philostopher]

5. We go about twice a year.

I think the closest 'Bed, Bath and Beyond' outlet (which, apparently, is more blue than red) is attached to the mall here. If not for that, and the fact that BB&B is a preferable option because of its political donations, we'd never go to the mall.

I've been on the 'hate malls' kick for a decade or so, though. I watched too many nice little greenspaces become pavement because they were near a highway exit, it always disgusted me. Add to that the fact that I'm fairly asocial and don't like being in crowds of people, and that if I can find any given product in a specialty store or mail-order it's likely to be cheaper, and I have less than no motivation to go to a mall.

We get lots of those consumer survey calls -- we almost never qualify, whatever they're calling about. They usually seem to be looking for people who have kids (we don't), are making payments on a car (we're not), watch a lot of television (we don't), or follow some kind of purchasing patterns that we don't. We're total outliers for people of our perceived demographic -- no kids, decent wages, but we never had any inclination to 'keep up with the Joneses' -- and the economy hates folks like us. We laugh about it, of course.

[Glenda]

6. The economy hates us... it hates our freedom!

I also enjoy being debt-free, not living from paycheck to paycheck, being able to take "sabbaticals" from the working world now and then, and staying away from the malls.

I read in a decluttering book to give disappearing gifts. So for Christmas I'm giving things like vitamins (that I know the recipient already uses), computer lessons (if I can get that arranged), etc. Maybe a few tshirts with liberal sayings - I can't help myself, we need to be heard even if it is our chests that are doing the talking!

Ok, I'm up too late, and more incoherent than usual :boring:

[LWolf]

7. My answer would have been,

"Once a year or so, when a group from work wants to eat lunch there." It's the closest place for lunch to my work site. It's also only 2 miles away from my house, but I haven't actually "shopped" there in about 4 years or so, and even when I did shop there, it wasn't more than once or twice a year.

[Dem2theMax]

8. I wish I could have talked to her.

I haven't been to the mall since 1999. LOL. And I'm never going back there again. Wheeeee! ;)

[Cats Against Frist]

9. Sometimes I take my son to the mall to go on the merry-go-round

and we eat lunch at one of the local places that has a stand in the food court -- but every time we go, it's "gnostic horror" for me. It's like living on planet alien -- watching the people walking around. Here's a great quote that I've always loved:

"For me, the best thing about cyberpunk is that it
taught me how to enjoy shopping malls, which used
to terrify me. Now I just imagine the whole thing is
two miles below the moon's surface, and that half the
people's right-brains have been eaten by roboticized
steel rats. And suddenly it's interesting again."

-- Rudy Rucker

And once again, I'll plug Walter Benjamin's "The Arcades Project:"

http://www.othervoices.org/gpeaker/Passagenwerk.html