Scribble and Scrambles - The Perils of Shopping

I may have mentioned this before. Forgive me if it's old news.

I stink at being a girlie-girl, at least in one area anyway. The area of shopping.

I used to have a purse obsession. I needed one, a new one, at least twice a month. As you can imagine, this adds up and involved much shopping. I was younger then, but it began to chafe so it became a short-lived obsession.

Then I moved on to the gray sweater stage. Not just any sweater, but a gray sweater. I still don't understand this particular desire. I'm not sure anyone looks fabulous in gray. "Hey, Marge your coloring just screams for gray."

Shopping for children took over from there. Really, babies need to have a hundred outfits in each size because you never know when they'll blow out a diaper. Fortunately, children develop likes and dislikes and soon enough they began to wear the same three things over and over again, so eventually I gave up on this one.

So I moved onto decorating my not-quite-completed house. Do I have to go into details, here? Not pretty. Let's just say if I liked it five years ago, it's pretty unlikely that I'll love it today.

Now in the waning season of life with girls who LOVE back to school shopping, Christmas shopping, post-Christmas sale shopping, Easter dress shopping (...I think you get the idea, right?) has soured me on the whole idea of piling into the car and driving to the mall. Shopping with my girls turns into more than I signed on for. LOOKING at EVERYTHING, DEBATING it, PUTTING it down, WAFFLING, returning to pick said item up and then TRYING it on make the shopping experience as pleasant as a trip to the dentist, without anesthesia. I don't know...maybe that's too overdone, how about as much fun as a kidney stone.

i hate shopping.

Oh, give me a list or a gift card to a specific store and I'll give er a rip. But...please...whimper...don't ask me to troll the mall with you.

My girls have gotten creative. "Mom. I need a pair of pants. Just need to go to Old Navy or Target." Do you know how many stores there are between Old Navy and Target in my mall? An educated guess...three hours worth. Dressing rooms number fifteen. Two coffee shops. That's right, only two. Two coffees over three hours and countless minutes waiting for the squealing, whimpering girl to come out of the dressing room to show herself...and then ponder whether or not she really wants the item. If I am expected to undergo this torture I should have an IV with painkillers or at least one of those hats with the sippy straws that hold two cans. I'd fill it with tall dark roasts and cream. Then I think I could do it.

So I'll have to tell you about my latest shopping encounter...but I'm running out of space. To be continued...