A hijacking, and bureaucracy bites back

Today, I’ve hijacked Misha Gericke’s blog, in the nicest way of course, to talk about the need for research in speculative fiction. Why not pop over and say “Hello”?

I’m preparing to give a talk at the Sidney library on “A Writer’s Visual Toolkit” - based on a series of blog posts I wrote a few years ago.

And further to last week’s post about my paperbacks snared in DHL-land, I filled in and emailed the form they needed last weekend. One week later, having heard nothing further and seeing my shipment still showing as awaiting customs clearance on their tracking site, I called again.

A very apologetic lady looked into it and said I should have received an email with the amount of duty payable. Had I? No! She told me how much was owing and gave me instructions for paying online. Duties paid, and I have my receipt to prove it - see, they do know my email address, they just don’t seem to know how to use it - I’m now back to the waiting game...