Diet Pepsi Crisis

I have to tell you about Steve and his diet Pepsi. As most of you know, Steve is addicted to the stuff. Anyway, here in India for whatever reason, plastic bottles of pop (which are about twice the size of a can of pop) cost 5 rupees less than a can of pop does. ($1 equals about 40 rupees) It honestly makes no sense to me why this is...maybe plastic is cheaper than aluminum? A case of 24 of canned pop costs about $15 USD. Anyway, with as much as Steve drinks, it makes more sense for us to buy bottles, since you get about twice as much for a little less cost.

Well I had found a grocery store in one of the shopping malls where I was buying the bottled pop at. I had been there 2 weeks in a row and had got some. Well, of course, this last week when I went to get some more, they didn't have any bottles. When I asked if they had any in the back room, they claimed to have never carried bottled diet Pepsi...only canned diet Pepsi. Of course I had to inform them that just the previous week I had bought bottles there.

Anyway they told me to come back in two days and that they would have some. Just to play it safe for fear that maybe now bottles where going to be hard to come by, I told them that I wanted 4 cases. (Plus I hadn't seen bottles in any of the other grocery stores I have been to.) Well, I went back 3 days later (giving them an extra day), and of course, no diet Pepsi in bottles. However, this time I actually got someone who sort of knew what he was talking about and was taking me seriously that I really wanted 4 cases of bottles and not cans. I think he could see that I was really starting to get ticked off. He told me to come back the next day. I said that I would not, but asked if they would deliver it (they had signs up in the store advertising free home delivery). Anyway, he took down my address and phone number...and low and behold a few hours later called to say that they could deliver that evening...of course, I wasn't at home, so I set up for them to deliver on Saturday at 4pm.

Well 4pm on Saturday came and went, and no diet Pepsi. At 5:15, I called the store...and right away, they recognized me as the diet Pepsi lady! Anyway, they assured me that my delivery would be coming that night. Well 6pm, 7pm, and 8pm, came and went without any delivery. By this time, Steve has given up hope that he is going to have anything to drink on Sunday. Well finally at 9pm (only 5 hours after when it was originally suppose to come), they finally show up with our 4 cases of diet Pepsi in bottles! Crisis adverted!

Lesson learnt again on delivery...make sure you give them a specific time frame of when you want the delivery made. To be fair, I had been warned about this happening here...the culture here in Chennai is very laid back...no one gets in a hurry about anything. Anyway, now I have learnt my lesson. But on the positive side, Steve didn't die of thirst on Sunday...plus it really was much easier to have the cases delivered directly to us instead of picking them up at the store, so I think this will be a reoccurring event in our household every couple of weeks. Now when we finally move to our house, I'll have to find a store near the house that will do the same thing...crossing fingers that this is easily accomplished.