Wednesday, December 08, 2004

The pitfalls of online shopping

I really enjoy shopping online. Especially for Christmas. If I don't need to go near a store or a jammed parking lot, I am happy like a drunk during happy hour. It is great.

Most of the time.

I finally got the list from my sis about gifts for the kids. Went to Amazon (front for Toys R Us) and found each of the items quickly. Liked that each was in stock and would be shipped within 24 hours. Zipped on through and placed the order. I am done. They should be at my door by Monday.

Everything except one item. That may be here on the 24th. WTF? Of course I do not notice this until I get the confirmation email. I go back to the site and suddenly it is out of stock. Hmm...did I buy the last one? If I had clicked through quicker would I have been assured of receiving it? Then my sister asks if we can exchange gifts on the 18th before my brother goes to the east coast. Not only could that put me in a bind with the gift but that would mean I have only 10 days to clean, and I may be out of town before that as well. I could always just clean one room and not let them leave that area. They could pee in the front yard.

So what do I do now? Of course this gift is for the 3 year old. She already read me the riot act a couple of weeks back. If I don't have a gift for her, I will be in major trouble.

I think the solution is quite simple. Go to Vegas. I am leaning heavily on it. It could be a decision that is made tonight.

UPDATE
Curiousity always gets the better of me. I went back to Amazon to see if I saw something wrong and lo and behold, the item is now out of stock. So now I may have gotten the last one. The page doesn't allow you order it so maybe I now own the last Aquadoodle in the country. When I receive it is still up in the air.

1 comment:

James Wigderson said...

http://search.ebay.com/Aquadoodle_W0QQsokeywordredirectZ1QQfromZR8

When in doubt, there's e-bay.