A heavy couple of days, but I now have a cardboard box containing 180 copies (well, I haven't actually counted!) of Kalender. There is slight disappointment in that the printers have reduced my A5 pages for some reason, which leaves an unplanned-for margin around each sheet and pictures that are smaller than I would have liked. But it wasn't their fault that I needed the job done in such a rush and that I couldn't check that all was well before they printed the whole lot. Having spent Sunday evening until midnight hammering out the page layouts with Trevor, and working on it on Monday morning right up to the minute when we just HAD to leave the house for our slash07 invigilation stint, it seems a miracle to have it at all.
Even collecting the finished publication was stressful, as we raced from the exhibition venue at 5.30pm when the show closed to get to the copy bureau before it closed – at 5.30pm. We had to stop en route at a cash machine – with a queue, of course! – meanwhile, I failed to locate the mobile phone as it rang reproachfully, the print staff understandably keen to know whether we were actually going to turn up so they could get off home.
But it's here now, and all that's left to do is to stuff a pressed wild rose petal into each of 180 small cellophane bags (don't ask!!) staple them onto 180 covers and rubber-stamp each front and back. Simple! And it's Corpus Christi tomorrow, and I haven't yet made any sort of plan for the day. So what am I doing about it? Cleaning the bathroom and washing the floors, that's what!! I've even given the porch a rare washing-down.
