what's up?

forth and back twice

uiuiui… it has been a while since I’ve been posting here. Amazing how time goes by. What so far did not go by: Our autumn here. It was frighteningly warm and dry. Bone dry. And way too warm and yes: I enjoyed it every day when biking to the factory; the factory where there are (still) piles of boxes waiting to be picked up. It’s like Sisyphos; as soon as I rolled an order out the next comes in. Which is fantastic,but came with the consequence that I did not find time to write here.

So… that ‘s been the sunny side of last week. The weather is going to change over the weekend and we are in for snow on Monday and temperatures below zero. Time to bring in my lemon tree that is full of lemons,- yes! imagine! lemons from Zurich- and the jasmine bush and a few other plants. Once it is inside, it will start blooming, well…. I guess within a month or two. I can’t wait for it’s indolic explosion.

So…the last few days I was basically running around from here to there, and back, with my fast shoes on, so to say (that’s the “why” behind today’s picture). But today I decided to take it easy. Like “what the heck”. You know: That’s one of the reasons why I survived the last few years so far without much damage; I have a built in “ah, what the heck” security valve for when the pressure get’s too high. Thus, some will need to wait until tomorrow until they get their answer about why we do not ship here or there.

Having said that: Here’s why we do not ship Explorer Sets to Australia anymore and will never do again, except super fast continental shift makes Australia move close enough to Europe for truck transport of our goods there. In the last month we have shipped one explorer set order there, twice: Completely correctly labelled, exempt limited quantity of dangerous goods. No chance. One shipment was stuck in Singapore, and although we sent all Material Safety Data Sheets there, through Fedex, a pile of 1 cm paper, it came back. And because it came back it with the paper on top of it it was heavier and we had to pay extra for back shipment, and our Fedex discount does not apply for back shipments. Yes. And in Switzerland, customs did not realize that it is just a back shipment hence we paid import tax and the Fedex handling fees. Total damage: 150 $, minimally. The second shipment came back because Australia’s authorities did not allow the import, as it is dangerous goods. Whatever. What the heck. I reimbursed the client who was patiently waiting for weeks. I wait for the second FedEx return shipment invoice and say to myself “what the heck”.

Nobody is to blame here, really. It is just that we are living in a crazy world. But, although we shipped with pleasure to Australia, I have more pleasurable ways of throwing my money out of the window, and decided to ship only samples there. Not more.

It is just a few weeks before the holidays and I can feel how many start getting a bit crazy.  Thus, it is important to remain ZEN.