A day at the mall

I took Molly shopping at Potomac Mills yesterday. We were looking for a prom dress, but came home with some t-shirts for Jack, shorts and a shirt for Megan, and two climbing gnomes that are now on my porch. I had no strong feelings for gnomes before we were house hunting, and read in one subdivision's HOA rules that "lawn ornaments are not allowed". OK, pink flamingos, I can see. But cute little gnomes and such? I was not going to live somewhere that boycotted fairy tale creatures! And so, my realtor friend presented us with our first gnome when we moved in, and they've multiplied since then. I will say the most recent ones I bought are a little evil looking, which I didn't notice till I was hanging them up. One is positioned as if it is looking into Molly's window. We'll see how long that one lasts.........

While I was waiting for Molly to come out of the dressing room at Neiman-Marcus (this is an outlet mall, I definitely cannot afford to shop there otherwise!) , I noticed a man, about 50 years old, exiting the men's dressing room side, wearing Bermuda shorts and a polo shirt and carrying pink plaid shorts and a tank top. He was wearing black pumps with 4 inch heels and walked very gracefully back to the shoe department, where he had left his loafers, presumably. In every other way except the shoes and his gait, he looked like a typical man his age. He had obviously had practice wearing heels. Later, we got pulled in by a kiosk salesman to sample some hand cream and nail products. I'd probably have completely ignored him had he not called Molly and me sisters. Yes, I am a sucker..........He was maybe 24 years old, and had long, shiny fingernails, which he told me are from using the products that he was selling. I'd probably have been more impressed had they been a woman's nails. On a guy, long clean white nails don't exactly advertise manliness!

Molly wanted to check out the sales at Hot Topic. The male cashier had quarter- sized gauges in his ears and his earlobes were flopping around every time he moved his head slightly. I saw several girls in the mall with facial piercings in odd places, like in the divot under their noses, and above their upper lips. I did not see any eyebrow or lip piercings that day, although I am sure there were some there! I can't be the only one who used to look at National Geographic and think that lip plates, and bones through the nose and big holes in the face were fascinating to look at, but definitely not desirable! All I can think of when I see this kind of thing is that one day they will be nursing home patients, and maybe instead of playing cards and shuffleboard, they'll compare tattoos and piercings. Maybe the nursing attendants will pull them around by hooking a finger through the holes in their ears. Bizarre.