I TOLD Geoff the other day that if he could arrange for Christmas to be put off until about April, I might be ready by then. As things stand at the moment, we’re destined to be the only household to lose half our bodyweight over the festive season. The only food we’re likely to have in the house is about 1kg of Twiglets (I found some on special offer and couldn’t resist a few twos for the price of one), the only drink will be tap water and the only presents will be some AA batteries (you can never have too many, I thought, as I hurled some special offer multi-packs into my basket).
Somewhere down the line, I am sure I am descended from Ethelred the Unready.
My distressing predicament has not been helped by two major spanners that have been thrown into the works of my pre-Christmas planning (in the loosest possible sense of that word, because me and planning are not normally seen in the same sentence).
Now I know I shouldn’t resort to the internet and I should only shop locally, but with time running out and being tied to my desk, a little bending of our usually firmly kept rules seemed just about acceptable. So, seduced by a £40 off voucher, I nipped online to order a dozen bottles of wine from an enterprise owned by Mr Happy himself, Sir Richard Branson.
Being an online wine-ordering virgin, the exercise took me probably even longer than if I’d closed down my computer, got the car out and driven to the nearest off-licence, taking in a scenic tour of Dorset on the way. As it was, I made it from registration to final logout with only two threatened nervous breakdowns. With delivery of the wine promised within seven days, I turned my attention to Amazon, where my daughter has very helpfully set up a wish-list. This comprises such diverse items as wellies, kitchenware, running shoes, DVDs and books, among them a volume so rarefied that it clocks in at £66. As we live near a wonderful independent bookshop it would cause me too much pain to do the dirty on them and buy books over the internet, but I thought I’d try and buy one of the DVDs and a cooking pot. It was only when I’d reached the post-checkout stage and was about to be irrevocably parted from my money that I noticed the estimated delivery date: “not before December 27th.” I backtracked swiftly and discovered the reason was that the pot was out of stock and the DVD was only available for ‘pre-order’ (whatever that is). I logged out, switched off and walked away to boil my head.
And so to the wine. Virgin Wines deliver five days a week. My case broke the rules by arriving at Saturday lunchtime, during one of those ridiculous downpours of rain. After the box had dried out a bit, Geoff and I opened it so we could lick our lips at what we’d chosen and savour the anticipation of drinking it.
“What on earth have we got here?” You’ve guessed. They’d sent the wrong case. Not one bottle matched my order.
So thank you very much, clever-clogs internet, but you’ve let me down twice. I need nothing more to convince me that shopping locally is the only sensible option and, for me at least, it saves time.
Leave a comment