WHENEVER people have sung the praises of internet shopping, I have always stuck up for the high street. I admit eBay's got its uses, especially in tracking down the sort of (un)popular music I prefer - generally stuff that's long since left the bargain bins at HMV.

I've bought the odd thing off the net, and sometimes use it to compare prices, but I'd much rather get my hunter-gatherer juices flowing on an expedition around a real-life city centre.

Touching stuff. Trying stuff on. Meeting real people. I never thought I'd be tempted to give up on the experience of shopping.

But that was before Christmas Eve.

I admit it was a bit last-minute, but I'd done my research and knew what I was after. A smallish music system with a digital radio, or a good digital radio that you could run an iPod through. I even had an idea of brands and models, so what could possibly go wrong?

Standing on the shop floor of a major electrical store in North Yorkshire, I was about to find out.

Nobody was serving me, so I wandered about looking for a music system among the DVD players and laptops. Nothing doing. I eventually collared an assistant, who said: "Yeah, we've got a couple, but they're out the back. One's about £300 and one's about £500." Then he stopped talking, so I walked out, speechless myself.

I did a bit of other shopping to calm down, then decided to have another go. It was, after all, Christmas Eve and everyone was a bit harassed.

Back inside the shop, I stood looking at digital radios because they, at least, were on display. The model I was after was there, so I asked the girl behind the till if I could get one.

"Ah," she said, after looking around. "That's the last one." Then she stopped talking, too.

I was running out of options if I didn't want to get back in the car and drive elsewhere, so I persevered. "Well, can I have that one?" "I don't know," she said. "I'll have to ask if I can sell it to you." She wandered off to get permission to sell something, and when she came back, it seemed I was in luck. She went off again and dug out the box, which was only slightly battered.

There was clearly going to be no offer of a discount for selling an ex-display model, but I did at least want to make sure it worked, so asked to try it. "We can't do that," she said. "There's no reception here, and they never get played. Do you want it?" (or what, she might as well have added).

Still, it was Christmas Eve, and this was a present. She did check the contents for me and noticed there was no lead and plug. Cue more ferreting out the back, and eventually a lead was produced. I paid my money and ran.

Christmas morning arrived and I felt quite smug. He was bound to love this radio. Plugged in, switched on nothing. Half an hour later we concluded it was the wrong lead.

Back to the shop on December 27, and an assistant agreed, took back the radio and refunded my card. "There's a delivery coming on Friday, but I don't know what's in it," he said. "You could try coming in on Friday afternoon or Saturday morning."

Or you could go home, find the identical radio online for around £25 less, and get it delivered to your door in perfect condition on Friday morning, which is what I did, and what I might do more often in future.