Kiosks are the evil trolls of the mall. They're always around the corner, waiting for you and your unsuspecting children, ready to steal your souls and curse you with senseless trends and tacky, over-priced products. Like Wind Spinners... 
"Ooh. Look at the shiny..."
They lurk outside the food court and in front of your favorite stores. If you walk quickly and don't look at them, you may escape. Sometimes they call out to you, nail-buffer in hand. You must not oblige them. They will hypnotize you, manipulating your impulses with bright colors and demonstrations of their magic tricks. You will end up buying Lucky Eyes, silk wrap skirts, hermit crabs, back-scratchers, steam-irons, or worst of all, Crocs. You will realize only when it's too late that you have paid too much for mere novelties, or thrown away a week's worth of what could have been coffee or gas money. Then you will walk past the dollar store, and see the same hot pink Crocs (which you shouldn't have bought anyway) being sold for the price they're really worth. You will bite into that "gourmet" cupcake and realize you could've bought a box of cake mix for the same price and had twelve cupcakes that taste the same! Tragedy!
Do not give them a chance! Pretend to be on your cell phone; act like you are blind, deaf, or foreign; make yourself busy and hit your child! Do not succumb to the retail trolls! Save yourself...
Dear Sir,
It's been such a pleasure meeting you and your wife. You seem like a lovely, mismatched middle-aged southern couple. I've enjoyed talking to your wife about the education system and the progression of the women's movement. (She's pretty intelligent, how'd you manage to snag that?) And you have also been enjoyable to talk to-- you apparently have a lot of experience in bullshitting people. I can appreciate that, as well as the relationship advice you tried to give me; sure, I may find it pretty useless, but I can see you're just trying to be nice and that it's not your fault your perception of relationships is so dated and stagnant. Perhaps you'd be interested in the Ashley Madison Agency? Oh, and don't worry, I already know the bartender just wants some tang. Men are like that, right? By the way, sorry to burst your lesbian-porn fantasy bubble-- my friend and I have not engaged sexually. I know, hard to believe. I guess not all girls have sexy pillow fights. And thank you so much for the wine you bought for us. It's not everyday a rotund, married middle-aged man buys a couple of young gals a drink. I do love a good shiraz.
But please, if you don't mind...
Stop. Touching me.
Thank you.
"Schnell, Klaus, Schnell!"
The Germans must know that, despite their beer, rosy cheeks and dorky-ass lederhosen, deep down we are afraid of them (you may not realize it, but you are). I caught these two exercising their intimidation on Miami Beach. Klaus here was tossing Gertrude into the air like pfannkuchen, while her expression remained ever-so stiff, and unfeeling, because Germans are really just extraterrestrial superbots. Their jolly culture is merely a parody of humanity, a cover-up until they take over. (The whole Nazi thing? That was actually a mistake. Hitler wasn't even one of them; he came from the "uber-dark side" and fooled the other superbots into following him. Dumb bots.) I was afraid, being about one-eighth their size, that one of them would come and flick me into the ocean, or use me as a hacky sack.
Only once before have I come into contact with a German. On an overnight flight to the Netherlands a few years ago, my seatmate fooled me with his lanky physique and kind, benign aura (a damn clever disguise). I figured him out when he pronounced "school" as "shool" instead of "skool". But I stayed calm, conversing casually and saying, "Ja!" to get him on my side. I think it worked because at 6 a.m., I awoke to him offering me a Sour Patch Kid- "Vould you like a sveetie?" And when a German offers you a "sveetie" ("sweetie" is another word for "candy" in Europe, by the way), you damn well take it. And you like it.
These guys? They left me alone, probably pitying my rabbit-like stature. Were they really even German? Err, I don't know. Maybe Austrian. Still. Scary, scary superbots.
"Wunderbar!"
"Ooh. Look at the shiny..."
