Ikea is great. I love how you walk through all those fake apartments that look way nicer than you could ever hope for yours to look and then are taken into a warehouse of flat boxes full of stuff that you can put together to resemble bookshelves and coffee tables but will never be quite right. I spend hours here meandering through the fake apartments.

But you know who doesn’t have that kind of patience or interest in interior design? Kids! On a Saturday or Sunday, parents from all over LA drag their kids to this Ikea to pick out new curtains or cabinetry. They try to ply them with frozen yogurt or meatballs from their little cafeteria, but the kids get bored. They start wandering off, jumping on the display beds, hiding behind the kitchen islands and just generally misbehaving. All the while mom & dad are engrossed in the geometric duvet covers and curtain sheers.

The great thing about Target, for me, is that it has multiple departments loaded with things I “need.” From clothes to power drills to 80s Dance Party mix CDs.

Unfortunately, that also means that it has multiple departments of things that kids think they need too. Spongebob toys. Dora the Explorer backpacks. Yo Gabba Gabba! DVDs. As you may know, kids and their parents often have different opinions of what they “need” and this can be the source of great conflict which means temper tantrums galore at Target. Keep this in mind when you find a discarded Pooh Bear in the automotive section: someone had to get out of there in a hurry.

Any mall is packed with kids, often with little or no supervision. I know my parents used to drop me off with $20 and leave me there for a Saturday. Of course, I never did anything the least bit obnoxious, but not all children are as well-behaved as I was.

The thing about the Galleria is that, even if kids are there with their parents, the mall is so massive that they still feel like they are alone and free to run around and cause trouble—mall security does not a babysitter make.

Maybe you should have to get carded to get into the mall. Then they could serve booze there too. I think I may be on to something…

The only reason I don’t like the kids at Best Buy is because they school me at the Guitar Hero demo and it makes me look like a chump.

In the middle of the summer, nothing sounds much better than slathering on sunscreen and taking in a Dodger’s game with a beer and a Dodger dog. This is also a great way for kids and dads to bond by getting dehydrated, bored and cranky! I need at least 4 beers to find baseball the least bit interesting, so I sympathize with kids getting bored, but that doesn’t mean I want to hear about it.

I used to live right up the block from this quintessential LA donut shop, which is small and affordable with lots of choices. However, one day when I found myself home from work, I went down to the ministripmall that houses Magee’s to do laundry around 2:30PM and was greeted by swarms of middle school aged kids. They were in line at the 7-Eleven and at Magee’s. The lines were out the door: screaming, gossiping, buying enough sugar so they could keep screaming and gossiping well into their 20s. It was truly a sight to behold that hope to never behold again.

I understand. This is a place for kids. I just stay away from here altogether.

Entering this Wal-Mart is South Los Angeles is like being transported to another world. It is complete chaos. But Wal-Mart is so cheap!

Much like Target, the annoying factor of kids here is high because there are so many different kinds of things that they just want so badly. Just get them the Minnie Mouse Sleeping Bag. Really.