The illusion of home delivery
Home delivery is wonderful. Be it the newspaper, bags of milk, posted parcels; all good. Why then, do I have to accept the delivery by proxy of various courier firms? A lot of stuff is brought, almost to the house, by those big trucks with logos. Please pay attention to the “almost”.
I know where the various courier depots are in the metropolitan area, because all the drivers deliver is encoded cardboard reminders that they’ve been in the neighbourhood. We’ve watched, and the old fashioned idea of someone knocking at the door, or ringing the bell is just that. Ordinarily, I find the traces in the newspaper box, or hanging from a doorknob. Then, forty-five minutes of crosstown traffic, while I complete the process by bringing me and my ID to the reception counter. A day later…
That level of expertise no longer impresses me. Internet sellers, are you listening?
We did the roadtrip thing today, down to visit relatives. With the dog. Due to allergies, the car served as a makeshift kennel for the afternoon (in a heated garage). The dog didn’t say much, after the fact, but my seat was damp with the exuberance of barking, and the harness and seatbelt were no longer “joined at the hip”.
Part of the afternoon was spent trying to explain the charms of online auctions (eBay, etc.) The best explanation I could find was practical: take an object from the stuff in the house, and show how someone else had already announced a value. You’re richer than you think.
