After much anticipation, the Makers Tiles have finally arrived!

We won’t get into the fact that Chestertown is so small and our barn is on such an uncomfortably wee street that the delivery truck refused to come to our door, and so Matthew had to drive up to the main thoroughfare to meet the driver who commenced to chuck the boxes to the ground with such alacrity that Matthew had to stop him and ask him to treat them gently, to which the delivery man replied, “They’re just books,” to which Matthew replied, “They’re MAKERS TILES,” which compelled the delivery man to treat them with much more care (or was it the fact that Matthew started snapping pictures of the whole process for posterity?) after which the driver went on his merry way and we kept the 19 boxes in the back of our van until a kindly neighbor from Chester River Press offered to store them with their recent shipment from China of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey in original Greek and in translation by Alexander Pope with beautifully wrought illustrations. The Iliad and the Odyssey have never been in such fantastic company.

Or is it the other way around?

At any rate, we rejoiced.

Kato was left at home, hanging woefully in front of the bay window, waiting for us to return with our loot. He managed a few mildly enthusiastic hops upon our return.

As supervisor and general quality control man, he also pointed out that it was lucky that we actually got what we thought we were getting, given that it looked like they were delivering “Markers” tiles, and that our name had once again been misspelled.

We are starting to think that perhaps we shouldn’t have tried to be so damned clever when naming our stupid company. If only Kato had been around then to warn us.

Anyway. We have kept one box out of storage so that we can arrange its contents pleasingly on our counter.

We will be sending them out to subscribers in the not-too-distant future, after which they will be available for purchase here. But not until then. Subscribers always get the first crack at these things. Because we love them. Because they so foolishly parted with their money already.

If, however, you are interested in purchasing the fantastic, beautifully produced, and very scholarly Iliad and Odyssey for that Classics major you know who has everything, go to Oak Knoll press and buy away. The fewer copies there are surrounding our Makers Tiles, the better our Makers Tiles will look.