I am a huge fan of online shopping, primarily because I’m not a fan on in-store shopping.
Honestly, I’m not really a shopper. I have friends who can go shopping for hours, going to many stores and trying on many outfits. Not me. When I finally break down and go to a store, I know exactly what I want, say, a blue dress shirt. I go to the section of the store where they sell blue dress shirts, I pick out one that’s my size, I pay for it and I leave.
But I don’t like malls. I don’t like crowds. I don’t like going to a crowded store at the mall looking for that blue dress shirt, only to discover that the store has every size imaginable except the one that fits me.
With online shopping, I can peruse a lot of stores in a just a few minutes, and I can do it in my underdrawers if that’s what I want to do. I don’t have to find a place to park. I don’t have to fight crowds. And my size is almost always available.
Then, in a few days, the friendly UPS man brings my order directly to my house. No muss. No fuss.
This is not to say online shopping is without fault. I’ve recently had two packages I was expecting get delivered to someone else.
But sometimes, you get lucky. A few years ago, a large department store sent me a gray sports coat that I hadn’t ordered. After several calls trying to find out how to return it, a nice woman, who couldn’t find any information about the coat, told me to just keep it.
I’ve had a string of similar good fortune the last couple of weeks. And this good fortune keeps coming in twos.
It started when I got an email from the Associated Press telling me that the 2017 edition of the AP Stylebook was available and would be shipped to me in a couple of days. The AP Stylebook is essential to reporters. It helps with spelling and punctuation. It provides consistency in a reporter’s writings. I get very excited each year when the new stylebook is released. I admit it. I’m a nerd.
A few days after I got the email, two packages arrived from the AP. Both contained a new 2017 Stylebook. The first thing I did was check to see if I was charged twice. I wasn’t.
At about the same time, I ordered a UGA T-shirt online. Two days later, two packages arrived, each containing one of the T-shirts. Again, I hadn’t been double charged.
That very afternoon, I went home and checked my mail. A few weeks earlier, I had subscribed to a magazine that I thought I might like. In my mailbox was two copies of this month’s edition of that magazine.
I wasn’t sure what to make of this lucky streak I found myself on. I told the story to a friend, who suggested I take advantage of my run of good luck.
“If you don’t buy a lottery ticket, you’re crazy,” she said.
Why not? It only costs a dollar, and who among us couldn’t use a stray $111 million, which was the jackpot that day. So, on my way home, I stopped at a convenience store near my house and bought a ticket.
I won $2.
