That's just it. With a typical gasoline or diesel car, you have to go to a gas station to refill your car. You don't have any other options.

With an electric vehicle, the plan is to essentially have the gas station come to you. Charging stations in homes, in parking lots, in parking meters....with the right infrastructure most people would have no need to ever visit a gas station. There are also induction charging methods being developed that can charge the vehicle without a physical connection (just like those charging mats for phones, ipods, ect). Because of this, we aren't that far off from even being able to charge the car while it's driving.

As I've said, the technology and infrastructure isn't totally here as of 2011. We're in the infancy of it, just like we were with internal combustion engine cars back in 1911.