Another Season Come & Gone....

Wow! Just what exactly happened here? Better yet, HOW did it happen? In the over 25 years I've been at this, this has been, by far, the most brutal season ever! It snuck up on cat's paws, and before I knew what hit us, we were in over our heads....and, by "we", I'm using the corporate "we"....ME would be a more apt term, because once again, I had to polish off this Christmas season as a solo act.

With all the Co-Vid stuff flying around, I just couldn't take any chances, so once again, the part timers are gone, and I'm at it alone. By & large, we got lucky, because for the short time they were back over the summer, I was able to lay in a supply of castings, but, the casting is the easy part, it's the painting that's the big bottleneck. When I'm casting, and really in my element, I can crank out a few hundred pieces in a couple hours....to paint them, well, that's another month or so.....

I don't know if it's just me getting older, or maybe I'm starting to get burnt out, or maybe every year Amazon raises the bar higher & people's expectations get warped, but every year, the Christmas rush just gets more & more difficult....People point, click, don't read anything I put on the website about who we are, how we work, what we do, etc (or, maybe they read it, and they just don't care) but it seems like the benchmark for hostility keeps getting higher, too....

Sorry if I'm rambling, my mind's bouncing all over the place as I try to collect my thoughts here, I've been putting in 18 hr days, 7 days a week, since Thanksgiving, and my mind is shot now. I pretty much got most of the "Christmas Sensitive" orders done & shipped, I'll still be working on & off throughout my break, but by & large, I'm on vacation. If I didn't get to you, I'm sorry, I gave it my best shot, which is pretty much all I can do.

It was a truly massive effort, I don't have all the numbers in yet, but it was somewhere around 500 packages shipped since Halloween....doesn't sound like much on the surface, but remember, it was one guy who pulled it off, and even though I didn't score a "complete victory", I'm still pretty proud of myself, nonetheless...

So, if anyone's actually reading this, let me just say "Merry Christmas" and thank you for your continued support, if your a regular, and "Welcome to the club", if your a newbie. Here's to next year, and hopefully getting some projects going, that have been put off for too long!

MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYBODY!!