One thing I will miss about living in the UK is home delivery. Many people here still do not drive, so many more companies offer home delivery.
Groceries, for instance. I know you can get this in the U.S., but at least among the people I know, it was seen as a silly thing to do. We all drive past so many grocery stores, it's silly to pay for delivery. But, I don't drive here, though I did live down the block from a large, new grocery store. Still, I couldn't carry but so much, and it got boring walking over there everyday in all weather. Sometimes my husband would walk over & carry stuff home too. Sometimes we'd drive & stuff the car full, but that meant wasting half of Saturday.
I began by ordering sometimes, to stock up so I could then get along for a while walking over every couple of days. Then sometimes I'd get more because I knew the weather was going to be too yucky to walk in, or I knew we'd be away visiting relatives on the weekend so unable to fit in a drive to the store. It grew. By the time we moved to this house, I had gotten in the habit of a weekly order. I'd just walk up to the local shop for milk.
THEN, the milkman came by & we started getting milk delivered 3 days a week. We never run out! I will REALLY miss milk always being magically there. Though we often forget to bring it in until Tony goes out the door. Not so bad in winter, but when the weather warms, that will be risky. I know it's delivered around 5 a.m., Tony sometimes doesn't leave until close to 10!
They also deliver a whole range of basic groceries: all the sorts of dairy products, eggs, bread, sugar, flour, & pet food. Not a bad brand, but not the brand we use, but we thought about it because the store we get pet food from requires a car to get to, so it required PLANNING. When we did go, we'd get 2 or 3 bags each of food & litter.
Then, when I was going out of town, we didn't go to the pet store the weekend before, & Tony didn't want to take sick baby while I was gone. I had bookmarked the petstores website long before, but thought the delivery fee too high. We were desperate though, so decided we'd just pay the fee this one time. While ordering though, I found out that ordering 50 worth gets you free delivery. So we ordered 4 bags of food and 4 bags of litter. Which lasted until last week. So I just ordered 6 of each, which should last 'til we move.
I will really miss home delivery. It's so great to 'run errands' at 11 pm in my pajamas, with a beverage on hand. Plus, I think I'm saving money by not picking up this & that while I'm in the store. My husband will tell you, I can this & that the budget pretty painfully.
