Shopping and the Suburbs

After running around shopping for home furnishings today, I was reminded of a key fixture in suburbs: the shopping mall. I really hadn't wandered around a true Aussie mall until today, and I can now say they aren't that much different from their American cousins. Clothing, food, and children's items seemed to be the focus. This particular mall had a couple of major grocery stores, which probably isn't all that weird, but not something I'd seen very often in California. Usually, the supermarket was its own big box store off to the side, or perhaps part of a Walmart. I can say the place didn't have nearly enough parking. And, now that I have a very tall vehicle, I can say there are some real problems finding a spot to fit it...most of the garage space is too short. That's definitely a major difference. In the States, most of the malls I've seen have probably twice as much parking lot space as floor space in the mall. Here is Australia, they all have parking garages.