And now for the irritated post...
It's been one of those weeks. But on Friday we finally managed to cut something out that has been hanging over us...
We wanted some nice wool for a customer, and finally found something that sounded excellent: Scotweb's Barathea in a very dark green.Price OK, colour OK, lovely fabric to work with. So we ordered it... And waited. And on the day we were supposed to see it arrive, they let us know there wasn't as much as we'd ordered! What should they do?
OK, we ask, how much is there?
We'll have to ask the warehouse. That could take a couple of days...
Gentle grinding of teeth. Please let us know ASAP, as this is getting urgent.
Next day they ring us back: 5.30m. Ok, we say, give us an hour and we'll work out if that is enough. We rapidly throw the bits onto 5.30m of calico ripped off the bolt to check the fit. It goes on. Just. And only because this style of doublet means there are lots of tiny bits that we can cram into spaces between the larger bits of things like the Venetians and the lower body and tab pieces... Good. Ring them back and tell them to send it out ASAP as this delay had made it an urgent matter.
It fails to arrive. By this time we are into the snow, and half of England is either gridlocked or hibernating. I email Scotweb to see when they sent our parcel out so I can find out from the carriers where it is and when to expect it.
Oh... The warehouse hasn't sent it yet. FIVE WHOLE DAYS AFTER THEY WERE TOLD THIS WAS URGENT? Because of their delay? Colour me unimpressed. So they sent it out on FRIDAY by next day delivery - in the snow. Saturday: no parcel. Monday, no parcel... But at least this time i had a delivery tracking number and could track it to see where it was: it had left the local depot, but was marked DELAY ON ROUTE. I rang the depot. The lovely lass was ever so good, and rang the driver. He said between 3 and 4pm. And was true to his word: it was here at a quarter to four. The lass at the depot said that while the roads had been cleared, there were areas where 'things had happened' over the weekend, and they were putting a delayed note on all deliveries in the area just in case... It just meant that until the driver was on the way to us from the last delivery, he couldn't tell exactly when he'd be there and it would be later than they usually hoped to get things out to our delivery point.
So by this time Su and I are deep into other folk's projects, and this one that we knew would be complex and would need more time had to be put back into the time shift area where we DIDN'T WANT IT because we wanted plenty of time to do miles of piping and work with complex shapes and odd bits and strange seams...
If you can hear a sort of crunchy sound, it'll be us grinding our teeth! And today I am going to be catching up on stuff that SHOULD have been done before, had we had fabric when we planned to make the projects up... Rather than having three things neatly lined up to do one after the other, we are doing three at once! Farewell, weekend!
Dammit, we had fabric from INDIA and the USA come quicker than this! For the same carriage fee we paid, we get stuff from Hainsworth, James Hare, and Henry Bertrand in under 24 hours! Scotweb have gone on the same list as McCulloch and Wallis: only if there is no-one else on the planet with this fabric. I don't understand how they stay in business when there is so much really good stuff coming out of India, China, and wherever so much faster! And with exemplary customer service, to boot.
Next week is pedal to the metal FTL sewing from morn 'til eve, from eve to dewy dusk - and beyond! Don't expect to hear from me...