Tuesday, February 26, 2008

cute kitty pics



Oscar. He's missing a toe (on the front foot not showing), I don't know the story (and he's not telling!), it was missing when he came. You can also see he has a few bits out of his ears. It's quite apparent Oscar stuck his cute little nose where it didn't belong quite a bit.



LBC giving me his best "Yeah, I'm sleeping in a case of Ramen noodles. What of it?" look. He's adapted to living in the house very well and is very sure of himself. He knows he's a mighty handsome dude.



Rickenbacker Straticaticus aka Ricky taking a snooze by the heater. As you can tell Ricky knows how to relax! (He's doing cat-yoga ;-) ) Mitzi, my oldest and most decrepit cat, is about to walk through the shot....



Ricky and Oscar. Oscar figured with Ricky on one side and the heater on the other he'd be nice and toasty. He's a clever little guy. Ricky is too easy-going to care about what's going on.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

the package

It isn't looking good at all.

I'm so discouraged.


They say they are still tracing it, but we aren't exactly a high priority customer, and although these paintings are of great importance to us, their liability isn't great enough to spend much time or effort looking for it. Better for them to send out a couple of emails and if no one remembers it offhand to just pay the claim on it and move on.

As for insurance/liability, Fed Ex's maximum liability for artwork is $500 per shipment, not per piece, so we are screwed there. And I don't know what Steve put down for a declared value either -- he's not great at that kind of thing.

FedEx Tubes, which this plain white round tube was put into have an adhesive strip down the long side but not on the ends. One end is kind of built in when you fold it into the triangular shape. I think that end probably did fine. The other end is a flap with "locking" tabs which are designed to secure it. Nowhere in the directions on the box (I have one here) does it say to use tape on the end and I'm pretty sure the guy who assembled it (not Steve but the guy at the FedEx counter after Steve left because they didn't have any tubes when SK was there) didn't even think to use tape on it. Although I haven't seen the empty FedEx Tube I bet the inside tube banged against the end hard enough to pop it open and then the inside tube just fell out. Chances are a couple pieces of packaging tape would have prevented it entirely.

You're probably wondering why it would need to go into the Fed Ex Tube in the first place if it was already in a tube, right? Well...because Steve was quoted a much higher price to ship the plain tube than the fedEx one and the guy at the counter said he'd just pop the plain tube into a FedEx tube when they came in later that day and Steve would get the better rate. I would have said ok too. You figure the Fed Ex guy would know what he was doing (although Steve did say he thought the guy was a bit of a slacker -- guess that should have been a warning sign).

Shipping/mailing, especially the initial one getting them over here, has always been the riskiest part of this operation as far as potential loss. We don't have pictures or really much of a record of them at all at that point. Again, Steve isn't really good at that stuff. That's a big part of why they come to me in the first place. We are going to try to keep a little better record of them before they get sent off. Even if it's just a digital snapshot of each one as it's finished. That won't prevent them from getting lost, and it doesn't mean if they do get lost that we will get their full value although it should help, but at the very least there will be a record of them. It's almost as if they never existed and that makes me oddly sad.

Saturday, February 16, 2008

oh shit turns to FUCK!

You know my "oh shit" entry from yesterday? Well I had my worst fears about it confirmed. The tube apparently made it to Memphis, but there's nothing in it. Yep, the paintings are lost. SK took them to FedEx in a large plain tube and one of the people at the counter said he'd put it in a FedEx tube to get the better rate (they were apparently out of FedEx tubes until later that day). Well somewhere along the way FedEx tube popped opened and the other tube fell out and they got separated. Because he expected the airwaybill to go on the tube, Steve didn't put any address or anything on that tube, so somewhere there is a plain white tube with a bunch of SK's paintings in it. One positive is if they can find that tube the paintings are packed into it very firmly, so they should be in good shape.

So now FedEx is going to look for the paintings (the rep I talked to said they actually do find some missing things) but needed to know as much detail about the contents as possible. I had to email Steve with the news and what info FedEx needs (number of paintings, subject, colours, signatures on them, titles on back, etc.). I really hated writing and sending that email -- not because Steve was pissy or anything (he wasn't), but because I knew he would be discouraged (and of course he was). He got back to me with the info and I was able to pass it on to FedEx. One of the paintings is a commissioned piece -- a multi-person portrait -- and the others are for an exhibit. And it turns out there are more paintings in there than I originally thought -- I thought there were three or four, but Steve says there were at least six and as many as ten. Damn. That really sucks.

On the plus side the customer service people at FedEx were apologetic when they said the stuff was missing and they seemed genuinely helpful and interested in trying to find it. At least it makes me feel a little better. The earliest they told me I could expect to hear anything from them is Monday, so I'm going to try to forget about it over the weekend. Worrying about it now won't help. I'll start worrying again on Monday. ;-)

Friday, February 15, 2008

oh shit

I'm probably freaking out over nothing but the Fed Ex package that was supposed to arrive yesterday didn't get here and when I go to the fed Ex site and track it shows no progress since it got an "Int'l shipment release" in Memphis at 1:33 am yesterday. Not only that but the estimated date of delivery part of the tracking page has suddenly disappeared. It shows the date it was shipped (the 12th), but not the estimated delivery date. I've never seen that before, even when a package is held up. And usually when it is delayed or held up there are updates shown on the tracking page, but there has been nothing since that 1:33 am notation. I have the horrible feeling this package is lost -- and it's paintings from Steve (one a commission).

I so hope I'm wrong and it's just delayed by weather or something. :-(

Saturday, February 09, 2008

Wah!

I am so putting off writing up my artist bio for the shop and shop website. I have maybe four sentences written and they are awful. I have a freaking degree in English -- I should be better at this crap. But I really hate writing stuff like this about myself. Thankfully one of the other members said she would take whatever I write and make it sound decent, so I'm actually working on it now. I've only been putting it off for about two years now....

Yep, I am a master of procrastination. Hell, I'm an Aquarius -- we're good at procrastinating. :-)

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

...because I'll get a blog out of it.

There have been some comments on my blog recently which I should have responded to, but being the slug I am I haven't. So I figured I could respond to them now and get a blog entry out of it! :-D

-- Phone calls/telemarketers -- I don't get many phone calls (really...who am I going to give my number to anyway?), and most of the calls I get, especially on my cell phone, are from people who's numbers I recognise. Calls from people whose numbers or voices I don't know right off -- or when there is a pause before the person starts speaking -- are generally telemarketers. I don't like telemarketers. Granted I've never really been inundated by them (I did do the do not call list Catz and it really did help), but I find them rude and annoying. Even the supposedly charity calls which aren't stopped by the do not call list irritate me -- partly because I'm cynical and think that most are probably scams. So, yep Veleska, that's why I was really hesitant when you first called but then ended up yakking my fool head off. :-D

-- Phone calls/SK -- yeah, hanging up on SK would be damned embarrassing. And it's not as much that he's SK as it is that he hasn't done anything to deserve being hung up on. I'd feel bad hanging up on any of you people too. :-) Guess I better get used to giving the calls I think are telemarketers (or bill collectors for the people who used to have my phone number, although those have tapered off recently) a bit more time before I hang up.

As for actually talking to SK I think most people would do just fine. If for some reason he got a bunch of fans phone numbers and decided to call some I think once people got over the "OMG! It's Steve Kilbey!" reaction they would have quite a nice chat with him unless they were totally rude or silly. Part of what would help is that if he calls it's almost certainly because he feels like talking, and when he feels like talking he's great.

-- exhibition. I didn't make it super clear, but the exhibition will be of Steve's work, not mine. If I'm feeling really ambitious (unfortunately that's not very likely) I will make sure there is plenty of my work up when his show is on so people coming to see his stuff will also see mine. I just set the time for it -- the whole month of May, and it will be in Yellow Springs. I'm going to have another blog about the current plans/ideas for it tomorrow (and will almost certainly blather on and on about it for the next couple of months). I figure at least some of you are interested in it, unlike my family members. :-( (I'm allowed to whine -- it's my blog! ;-) )

-- Steve Kilbey Live DVD -- Catzy asked about this. It's one of the solo shows Steve did in New Zealand last year (when the fucking Church was supposed to be touring here! Wah! >:( Ok that was never officially planned, but I heard rumours about it and wanted so much for it to be true...). He really seems to be enjoying himself and the audience was enjoying it too. He said this was one of the best solo shows he'd ever done. You can order it online here.