Well ... yes and no. After the re-carving was done, I told you back on September 8th that Tetsui-san had the re-done blocks in hand, along with my new sample, and was ready to get going. He knew about my schedule - I'm leaving on the 30th - and the idea was to get the prints to me before I left, so that I could arrange for Yasui-san to get trimming and packaging.

I called him up on Monday, but he wasn't there; his father said that he was out on a music job. I called back the next day, and managed to catch him. He hasn't started yet.

I had also been repeatedly calling and writing emails to illustrator Seki-san, to try and get the Autumn set moving forward. She sent me the first roughs in the first week of September, but they weren't suitable at all, and I had asked her to try again. The new batch arrived on Sunday evening. They have some promise, but I have a number of things that I'd like to talk with her about in person (email is too difficult), so wrote to her to try and arrange a meeting one day this week before I leave. I suggested (in turn) three different dates, but she wrote back each time to tell me that she had 'other affairs' that made it not possible. She finally wrote asking if we could meet when I got back from Canada.

But that won't be until October the 13th ... not exactly the best schedule for getting started on the Autumn set!

I got a bit peeved, and just told her to 'forget it' for now; I'd get back in touch later.

So there we sit. The project that showed such good promise back in the spring - with all three of them being enthusiastic about it, and (apparently) eager to move forward - has bogged down in prevarication by two of them (Sato-san the carver has been exactly the opposite of this - his work has been done extremely quickly, with great enthusiasm).

I chatted with Sadako about all this last night, and her analysis of the situation is that I've been 'too strict' - Tetsui-san and Seki-san have thought I have interfered and 'complained' too much ...

On some reflection though, I'm not ready to accept 'guilt' here. I think I have been flexible and understanding at every stage. If they think I'm too domineering, they should slip back in time a bit to meet one of the old publishers!

So what happens now?

I'm not sure. I'm going to give all this some thought during the next ten days or so while I'm away from the workshop, and decide what to do when I get back.