I've done a fair bit of online shopping, especially when it comes to presents. I absolutely hate regular shopping, and only ever do so if I know exactly what I want to buy so I can be in and out of a shop in less than 10 minutes. Grocery shopping is different though, sure I hate the crowded supermarket aisles and the people who leave trolleys as obstacles that you have to navigate around. The screaming kids and the people who are trying to get you to sample something with their shouty voices and annoying tones (see the bottom of the hub).

But I love picking out my own stuff. When I go grocery shopping I know that everything that goes into the trolley has been chosen by me and it's exactly what I want. That's why I've never tried online grocery shopping.

Getting from the car to the apartment is an effort to say the least. There's no way that we could carry all our shopping from the car to the apartment in one go, so we use nifty bags with wheels, along with regular shopping bags. This may sound easy, but you have to take into account that the path from the car to the doors of our apartment block is made up of cobblestones. Have you ever wheeled anything over cobblestones? It's hard enough to walk on them without tripping, so dragging a bag with wheels over them is a feat.

This would of course be made easy by shopping online and having our groceries delivered to our door by some nice person who had to wheel the shopping over the cobblestones for us. But no.

Having groceries delivered to the door sounds like such a luxury to me, because after the cobblestones, then there's the stairs. The stairs lead up to the main doors of the apartment block. Then after the stairs, there's a heavy glass door to stumble through. Then there's the lift, a long corridor and more heavy doors.

I've visited an online supermarket site and sure it was fun to click around. I guess it might be easier to budget when buying online, plus you won't get enticed by the lure of special offers on stuff that you don't need.

Essentially, I suppose that online grocery shopping is a really useful service, just one that I won't be using in a hurry.

For me, the biggest turn off about online grocery shopping is that I can't choose my own products. I like to get the best use by dates and I purposely check the shelves for the best ones I can find. Someone who is doing my shopping for me won't do that.

I've seen the online shopping staff in the stores, they walk around with their electronic lists and pick the first ordered item from the shelves. They don't look at dates, at least, I haven't seen one do so yet.

I'd make a great online staffer because you would get the best dates I could find. The supermarket probably wouldn't be too happy with me, but hey.

Another thing about shopping online is how are they going to know that I don't want fat on the steaks I've ordered. I want the leanest, most rich in colour steaks that they have. Is that what I'm going to get? Or am I going to end up with the fattiest, use by tomorrow steaks? I don't want use by tomorrow, I want the longest use by date they have, then it means the freshest.

What about fruit and vegetables? Do they know that I want my melon ripe so that I can eat it over the weekend? Or am I going to have to wait until Thursday until it ripens? Are my courgettes going to be the right size? I like them younger and smaller, not half way to becoming a marrow!

What about fish? I think you probably get my dift.

But I haven't touched upon other products. What about shampoo? Is it going to arrive in perfect condition or has it got a dodgy lid and leaked and covered my groceries with it's gooey mess? Has my soap powder got a hole in the box and left a trail from the store to my apartment?

It's all too risky for me. I like rummaging around aisles looking for the best I can buy.

I'm sure that there are a whole host of people who shop online for groceries and are perfectly happy with the service they get. Maybe I'm wrong about the guys and girls who walk around doing shopping for other people, but I don't think so.

How can a complete stranger know exactly what I want from my food, and why would they care anyway? I don't expect them to and so that is why I won't be grocery shopping online anytime soon!

I'd just like to make it clear that I don't class all the people who do this job as annoying and shouty. I shop in the same supermarket every week and I've had some very nice people who have given me samples, but there is this one woman who is driving me mad.

Every week she's down a different aisle with a different product. This tiny little woman with the most shrieking voice I have ever heard. "Come and get your free sample of....." at the top of her voice. Lately I've noticed that she notices me, and as a regular shopper there, that's no surprise, but what she does when I walk past her is shriek in my direction, seemingly as loud as she can.

I think she knows that it's driving me mad and as the weeks go by I am slowly thinking up ways of depositing her into the freezer section with the frozen offal.

Maybe I should do my grocery shopping online after all.