Wednesday Oct. 22

Got some devastating news on Monday: After weeks effort and preparation trying to get 24 Playing Gods games to the big board game convention in Essen Germany, (dozens of phone calls and e-mails, checking prices and freight options, hassles, worry, packing and repacking boxes, and $320 in shipping charges), the games will apparently NOT be available for the big show. I had wanted to have a proper launch in Germany, as I think that Playing Gods– much like David Hasselhoff and Who’s the Boss? reruns— will be big in Germany. The games arrived on time, but I was told by the German distributor that he would not have time to go to the Customs office and pick up the games in time to make it to Essen. After all the effort and stress I put into it, it was a real body blow.

A few hours later came the second smiting of bad news: My main shipment of games was released, which is good. But while the usual Customs inspection fee is about $100 or $150, I was being charged $1,300 in inspection fees. I wasn’t expecting to have to come up with $1,300 in extra costs, and I had to put it on credit, which was not a good idea because of the high interest rates, but I had no choice. All in all a gloomy day… The silver lining, if there be such, is that the games are allegedly arriving Thursday, FINALLY. If all goes well (and I have no real reason to expect it will), I’ll turn around and send out games within hours, sending hundreds of games to the farthest corners of the globe. More as it develops!