Mall Rant...

Warning: This post contains some crankiness... Although I am not cranky as I write it, I was admittedly cranky as I lived it... read on at your own risk...

First of all let me just start by saying... I really, really, really dislike the mall we have here in Clarksville. It is so "second rate" at best... Clarksville may not be a big city, but we are big enough to have a decent mall! (Approx. 160,000 not counting neighboring communities or Ft Campbell according to the Montgomery Co. website.... my rants are nothing if not fact filled...) I lived in a small city in Montana (less then 30,000) that had a better mall. We do have a few of the usual stores, but our mall about half made up of little Mom & Pop stores... charming...not so much...unless you are looking for cheap oriental imports or furniture or to buy a house...why would you be buying a house at the mall, and do you really want to buy a house from a realtor in a food court?

So, yes I don't like our mall, but I have teenagers so from time to time I find myself there. That was the case yesterday. The girls had plans to meet friends for a matinee (ahh... the joys of homeschooling..) so I took this middle of the day trip to the mall as an excuse to go look for some bargains on the clearance racks of the girlies favorite stores... teen shoe store... no problems, we even got two pairs of cute spring shoes for $10.38...total for both pairs! (score) We head down the hall passing the goth clothing chain.. (don't get me started about the irony of teens "expressing their individuality" by shopping at this particular chain store...) but they did have a big Alice in Wonderland display in the window... so we went in to see if there was anything to inspire me for the craft swap I'm working on... we don't usually shop in this store, and I must admit I didn't know you could get "pleather" corsets in so many colors....

From there we headed to a certain "patriotic bird" chain... one of the girlies favorites. Sparkle was in need of some new tops so when we saw that the clearance was a additional 30% off we went to work scouring the racks... we found three cute tops that I declared to be exceptional buys so we headed to the dressing room. This is where things go downhill fast...
Here is what happened...

ME: "Can we can use the "handicap" dressing room so we have more room to spread out?"

EMPLOYEE: "No mam, we reserve that dressing room for handicap people and those with strollers..."

ME: (I do a quick glace around and said... )"Since there isn't anyone even in the store right now that fits the description, can we your current customers use it?"

EMPLOYEE: "I guess so mam, but you can't go in with her, we only allow one person in a room at a time."

ME: "It's ok... I'm her mom..."

EMPLOYEE: (sarcastically) "That's our policy"  (please note... we shop here quite a bit and I always go in with the girlies...in fact we usually all three go into the same dressing room...)

ME: "Is this a new policy?"

EMPLOYEE: "no mam..."

ME: (admittedly starting to get annoyed) "Well, I do see the value of this policy for a couple of teens you don't want any funny business, but I need to see how these tops fit so I can determine if we want to purchase them..."

EMPLOYEE: (flippantly) "well then just have her come out and show you..."

ME: (cranky and affixing my best mom glare): "Let's look at my daughter for a second, oh look she is wearing a dress... do you suggest she come out to show me these tops in her underwear?"

EMPLOYEE: (mumbling about not wanting to got into trouble... not realising he already was..) "follow me..."

(we enter the big dressing room)

NEXT CUSTOMER IN LINE: "I'd like to go in with my daughter too..."

We actually had good luck with the tops and bought all three for 8.69 TOTAL!!

Next I left the girls by the theatre and headed to my car. I had errands that had to be run... no movies for me today.... sad... one errand involved Hobby Lobby... happy...

As I pull out of the parking lot my cell rings...

CURLY: "Mom... you need to come back here..."

ME: "Why..."

CURLY: "The security guard thinks we are skipping school and said either you need to come back or he's calling the police..."

ME: "tell him you are homeschooled..."

CURLY: "I did..."

ME: "put him on.."

SECURITY GUARD: "Mam (I am starting to hate the word today...)... I need you to come back and verify these teens have permission to be out of school."

ME: (sounding annoyed to say the least) "They have my permission..."

SECURITY GAURD: " Mam, you need to verify in person you are their mother...(How... does he want to see my sreach marks??)  I could be speaking to anyone right now..."

ME: "Yes, but they probably wouldn't be as annoyed as I am... I'll be right there!"

I Pull back into parking lot via back entrance... drive all the way around mall.... search for parking... storm into mall... "I am loaded for bear"...girlies see me approaching... (pimple faced guard dude does not...) Curly looks down, she clearly feels bad (poor girl...she has such an embarrassing mom)... Sparkle see me, grins sheepishly and says to their "Guard"... "look out..."

Don't worry, I let him off easily... he could still walk... although I think he did need to go sit down for a minute... In the little "roped-off" desk our pathetic mall calls the "security office" (Picture desk in middle of mall hallway, roped off with those rope barriers they put in banks and fast food restaurants to control lines... classy mall y'all...)

Ahhh... I love the mall...

Let me just say... if either of these people had spoken to me with respect... without what can only be described as "snarky" bad attitudes... I would have been much calmer... I know they were just doing their jobs... but the level of rudeness and condescension was totally uncalled for... what happened to "customer service"?...

Thanks for listening,