Dissection of a Stressful Shopping Experience

It's hard to believe that shopping can actually be stressful, but when roaming a shopping mall filled with distractions and interruptions, one can become rather frustrated, almost (or not) to the point of yelling without realizing the pitch of one's own voice. The following are some undesirable aspects of the shopping experience and how to deal with them.

1. Hyper, Screaming Children. If you ever walk through a department store in the middle of the afternoon, you begin to wonder whether people are just having more kids in general, or if they simply gravitate towards your unsuspecting legs. There's nothing more aggravating than searching for your size amid a rack of jeans and simultaneously being bumped by a strange child elatedly running through the store. And what's even worse is when you carry said jeans to the dressing room, and on your way you nearly trip over the same child as it stands blocking your path and aimlessly wandering with a wide-eyed expression. And to top it all off, the same child screams behind you while you wait on line to buy the jeans. It makes you question if you want the jeans enough to torture yourself like that. The solution: Ignore it. Or leave the store. But really, is it so annoying that you'll deprive yourself of a great new piece of clothing?
2. Loud, Booming Music. You walk into one of those hip, expensive stores where the employees all where headsets, the manikins have no heads, the shelves are made of frosted glass, and the music is so loud you can't even hear the clothes calling you like they usually do. One can become very stressed when exposed to a loud shopping experience. The solution: Rush through the store, looking quickly at the merchandise, and then bolt for the door. It's probably all too expensive anyway.
3. Crowds of Slow People. There's nothing worse than trying to quickly make your way to the next store as the person walking in front of you slugs along at a snail's pace. And when you try to pass them, they move towards your nearest space. The solution: Run past them, even if it means you have to bump them gently out of they way. Those clothes are waiting for you.
4. Aching Feet. Shopping is brutal, and anything involving walking miles through a shopping mall and carrying heavy bags of clothing while trying to balance in your new sky-high peep-toe wedges and keep your purse on your shoulder can cause you pain, especially in your feet. The solution: Take a breather and buy yourself a pretzel, or a nice Orange Julius. Nothing gets the shopping juices buzzing like a nice taste of mall.
5. Small Store, Big Racks. So you see a cute top in the window of a store, and you pop in to check out the price tag. The only problem? The top is at the back of the store, and the route to get there is like a maze through a wild jungle of fashion. Your purse strap hooks itself onto a hanger, you accidentally knock a pair of pants of a shelf, and when you bend to pick it up, you knock over something else. When you finally get to the top, you see that it's ridiculously expensive, and the route back to the door is the same jungle. The solution: Fight those clothes! Use your oversized purse and shopping bags as swords and chop those racks out of your path! You're a girl on a mission!

And the number one rule of shopping? Have fun, and bask in the therapy of fashion.