Yes, this is the droid I've been looking for...

The boy is really, really hard to buy for - but three weeks before Christmas I looked around online and found the R2D2 lego set and knew he would love it.

I was at work at the time so I thought I'd wait until I got home before ordering it online.
But in the few short hours that passed, New Zealand seemed to have completely sold out of the buggers.

The Warehouse, who'd 6 months earlier sold me the boy's birthday (a Millenium Falcon lego set) present at a welcome discount price and delivered super-promptly, had let me down.

In desperation I went to the main Lego website and ordered it from there. These guys are based in Europe, I'd never ordered from them before, and I was acutely aware of the fact that when you order online from a foreign site you aren't covered by NZ consumer laws (this is what I mean by desperate).

According to Lego folks, as long as I ordered it by 8 December it would get here in time for present-opening day. It was the 6th. Phew.

But a week went by and the status stayed at In Process. After previous experiences with Fishpond, I was sure this meant that they didn't have any in stock and were probably fishing around for one - and if they didn't have one I wouldn't find out until weeks later!

So TLM and I went to look for back-up presents. We found a cool grey t-shirt screen-printed with the image of an enormous sandfly. It was very New Zealand but in a non-kitshy way. Score!

Two weeks went by and I realised the boy was not going to get his R2D2 lego. The stress was getting to me (you could tell because everyone in the office now knew of my plight). I emailed Lego to find out what the story was, then went looking for another back-up present. I found a Star Wars origami book, including the necessary papers at the back of the book. Score!

Lego replied to my email stating that the status of my order had been updated to Shipped. Hmmm...it's supposed to take up to 13 business days to get here. There are only about 6 of those left.

Then, on the Friday before Christmas, a large, plain brown box appeared at our door. It had arrived! On time! The boy loved it!

Hope you've all had a wonderful Christmas.