About 8 months ago I found myself in possession of a mysterious surplus in my National Discount Brokers online account. I don't know where it came from and I didn't ask, but I decided to throw some money in the general direction of this great dot-com revolution-- invest a few bucks in a company or two that I felt had a solid future. And maybe I would get rich quick and be able to retire at 27. You never know. So I invested in Webvan. At 5 bucks a share. 'Cause I thought, hey it's 5 bucks a share. It can only go up from there, right?

Anyway, I don't really want to talk about that or my CNET stock right now. But the failure of dot-com ventures is all over the news, and if you follow sites like f****dcompany.com, you can actually witness the slow agonizing death of ecommerce companies as they realize that the gold rush is over. No more web site and no more e-commerce. Oh, but for your enjoyment here are some resumes from our employees as you ponder what happened to your most recent order of Puppy Chow. Nothing to see here folks, just the downfall of the dot-com empire. Move along now.

For good reason, a lot of people are pretty concerned about the future of the dot-com industry. People have stock in these companies (like me), they work for companies that are in a precarious position (me again), or they rely on dot-com clients and partners wavering on the brink of bankruptcy. I'm concerned about these things as well, but mostly I'm worried about having to go back to Safeway to do my grocery shopping.

I haven't gone near a grocery store since January. Safeway is but a distant memory in my mind. Sure I go to the corner market for staples like bread and milk and French vanilla flavored coffee creamer but physically going to the Big Commercial Grocery Store with the aisles and the wobbly carts and the long lines-- that's just not part of my world vision anymore. I am a Webvan customer. I place my order in my pajamas and they bring my groceries to my apartment, the way it should be. It's not just the fact that I never want to leave my apartment or get dressed to do my errands. I've realized that I'm just not very happy with the usability at Safeway. The navigation is awful, and the information architecture is a joke. If you can't find something or don't know a price, there's very little technical support available. Offline grocery shopping is a really bad user experience.

At this point, giving up Webvan in favor of Safeway or Albertson's would be like the time-traveling Star Trek movie Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home where Kirk and crew go back to the 20th century and they have to take the bus and use computer keyboards and such. Oh how quaint, going to a grocery store! My stars! I might as well be milking cows and churning butter over here.

So last week I got an email notice from Webvan and I was sure this was it-- the Dear John letter from my beloved online grocer telling me that it was over. Luckily they were just notifying me that they would be charging for deliveries under 75 bucks, and I breathed a heart-felt sigh of relief. Another life crisis averted.

Whenever the Webvan delivery guys come to my apartment bearing groceries, I grill them--subtly and tactfully--on the future of the company. For some reason I have this idea that the delivery guys have in-depth conversations with the CFO before they pack their little yellow and green crates and head out to my place.

So the delivery guy is busy unloading all my junk on the counters when I start my interrogation.

Me (dressed, cause I order in my pjs but I put on clothes for the delivery guys): So how's it goin'? Busy today?

Matt/Mark/Brad/Steve: yeah, a bit backed up at the warehouse.

Me: oh yeah? Well "busy" is good.. Would you say there's a lot of excess inventory at the warehouse?

Matt/Mark/Brad/Steve: no, just a lot of people loading up trucks, you know?

Me: sure, sure. Hey, you gotta have order fulfillment, right? (nervous chuckle). So you enjoy being a delivery guy?

Matt/Mark/Brad/Steve: yeah it's all right.

Me: you get stock options?

Matt/Mark/Brad/Steve: yeah.

Me: that's cool. So how do you think the stock will perform over the next quarter?

At this point I sometimes get some PR spin from the delivery guy about how they're "really confident" that the stock is going to get up to 60 or 70 by the end of the year. Then he prints up my receipt from that cool little Webvan Palm and leaves me to put away my groceries and ponder what my life would be like without the glory that is home grocery delivery.

I'm not normally very optimistic, but in this case, I'm going to trust that the delivery guys know what they're talking about. I believe that Webvan will continue to expand into uncharted online grocery markets, and that someday everyone will be able to order French cheese, deli quality meats, and surprisingly fresh produce and have their groceries delivered to their home by friendly and knowledgeable delivery guys like Matt/Mark/Brad/Steve.

Now I just have to worry about the future of Kozmo, because if I have to start going to the video store to rent videos again, I'm going to go into anaphylactic shock.