Are there adequate words to describe how much I hate the suburbs?

I feel a little hypocritical ranting against suburbia because a.) I grew up in the suburbs and loved it and b.) What started this all in the first place was a self-imposed trip to the suburbs, so I guess I brought it all on myself.

So there I am. At a shopping center in the suburbs. On a Friday night. And first of all, I am struck by the sheer mass of humanity that is OUT at a shopping mall on a Friday night. Then it hits me that most of these people are under 20, which I don't see a lot of in my insular little hipster world. The teens, they are a changin'. They have more money than my parents and they look MEAN. So that's annoying.

As for the adults, everyone is out in their SUV/Minivan/Hummer wearing plush track suits pushing their $300 jogger strollers. I don't know why I find that so loathesome. No one is walking fast. Or driving fast. Everyone seems to be migrating towards the Claim Jumper for dinner.

There's no THERE there in suburbia -- I think that's my problem with it. It's all mass produced chain stores/restaurants with no imagination. The people start looking less like people and more like cattle. What pisses me off is that five years ago (or whatever) these people were, in all likelihood, hip singletons who lived in the city and went out after 9 p.m. and explored art and music and weird movies and here they are now in the burbs walking around the Sunglass Hut on a Friday night. It just seems a little defeated. And I'm there too, with them, so I can't judge.

But let's just say I breathe a sigh of relief after I cross over the water and back into the city with its homelessness and its litter and its lack of parking. I'm home.