Books! And what to do with them!
So, PS Part Three arrived quite literally at my doorstep in the midst of a persistent sleet. After scrambling to get the palette of boxes inside one by one, they landed in my living room.
After cracking open a box to verify that everything was in order and the books were indeed beautiful, I made dinner and relaxed for the evening. (We watched "Hot Fuzz", which was super awesome.)
Today, I attempted to ship a batch of 50 books out to all the kind souls who'd pre-ordered Part Three at conventions in the past year and a half or so. They've been waiting the longest, and I figured it was only right to do so. This turned out to be more work than I'd anticipated.
Trouble was, after signing, personalizing and drawing in 52 books, I had to find a way to get everyone's addresses into PayPal's Multi-Order shipping tool, so I could pay for postage. This is trivial for online orders, since orders are imported directly, but it's trickier to create new ones. Luckily, the tool imports CSV files, and I'd kept a spreadsheet of all the information. After a little export/import dance, I got the names into the tool and began printing out postage. Only, instead of printing them out in the order I got them, they all printed alphabetically. Not a big deal, except I'd just signed all these books, and they were in chronological order. So, an hour of paper sorting later, all the materials were ready to go.
(Break for dinner)
Now, I pause in my narrative to mention that over the past week and a half, I mentioned I've been doing these little ink sketches for all these pre-orders. I've been quite fond of them, and when all 208 are put together they form a fairly impressive stack. I've been foisting them on people all week.
Anyway, I'm quite reluctant to break them all up now, but alas. At least I scanned them all.
After the evening victuals, I resumed my work, starting with attaching to postage to the envelopes. Two rolls of tape and 6 episodes of "This American Life - Season 2" later, I finally wrapped it up, sealing the last envelope. The first batch of 51 orders are ready for a march to the Post Office in the morning.
Seriously, I had no idea this would take nearly 12 hours. I should note that I only had a few more orders than this for Part Two back in late 2006, but it took two days to ship the same amount -- with the help of two friends. I had forgotten. Well, it seems I've gotten a little better at this since then. In any case, I have to do this three more times before I get all these orders out. Hopefully, I should have this done sometime next week.
After cracking open a box to verify that everything was in order and the books were indeed beautiful, I made dinner and relaxed for the evening. (We watched "Hot Fuzz", which was super awesome.)
Today, I attempted to ship a batch of 50 books out to all the kind souls who'd pre-ordered Part Three at conventions in the past year and a half or so. They've been waiting the longest, and I figured it was only right to do so. This turned out to be more work than I'd anticipated.
Trouble was, after signing, personalizing and drawing in 52 books, I had to find a way to get everyone's addresses into PayPal's Multi-Order shipping tool, so I could pay for postage. This is trivial for online orders, since orders are imported directly, but it's trickier to create new ones. Luckily, the tool imports CSV files, and I'd kept a spreadsheet of all the information. After a little export/import dance, I got the names into the tool and began printing out postage. Only, instead of printing them out in the order I got them, they all printed alphabetically. Not a big deal, except I'd just signed all these books, and they were in chronological order. So, an hour of paper sorting later, all the materials were ready to go.
(Break for dinner)
Now, I pause in my narrative to mention that over the past week and a half, I mentioned I've been doing these little ink sketches for all these pre-orders. I've been quite fond of them, and when all 208 are put together they form a fairly impressive stack. I've been foisting them on people all week.
Anyway, I'm quite reluctant to break them all up now, but alas. At least I scanned them all.
After the evening victuals, I resumed my work, starting with attaching to postage to the envelopes. Two rolls of tape and 6 episodes of "This American Life - Season 2" later, I finally wrapped it up, sealing the last envelope. The first batch of 51 orders are ready for a march to the Post Office in the morning.
Seriously, I had no idea this would take nearly 12 hours. I should note that I only had a few more orders than this for Part Two back in late 2006, but it took two days to ship the same amount -- with the help of two friends. I had forgotten. Well, it seems I've gotten a little better at this since then. In any case, I have to do this three more times before I get all these orders out. Hopefully, I should have this done sometime next week.