Dennis Peacock......I know where you live.....

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

.....because the box of pen blanks you sent FINALLY arrived :D:D:D:D

It is post marked June 15th, it is Aug 19th here, so two solid months, wow, that is even late, by two weeks of the post office's worst time estimate.

Yes the package was again opened by Japan Post, I guess I PO someone down there at some time...?

From now on, I'll get stuff sent to my L shop with my wife's name on it.

Dennis, your generosity is only out done by what a great guy you are!

Folks, I got me a whole lot of pen turning to do, man are some of these blanks outstanding!

Sorry, no pics yet, I'm in the middle of restaurant deliveries, and you can imagine they are brisk on a HOT & HUMID Saturday night.

Pics later!

Cheers!!

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

OK, here are pics.........

45196

45197

How do you like that? !!

Nice stuff! :D

[Dennis Peacock]

Woooooo-Hoooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm very relieved to know they made it. Now that you have some pretty good "eye-candy" there.....let's see some PENS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :rolleyes: :cool:

Enjoy Stu.....some of the best wood for some of the best people!! :D

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

Thanks again Dennis, I told you them Postal guys got it in for me :rolleyes:

What I need is some pen making kits, I've run out, I guess I'll have to order some :D

[Claude Arragon]

The pen blanks are great, but what stands behind them is quite attractive. The intensive usage of the content of these bottle will certainly make you beleive that your pens are twisted :)

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

Yep, there is easily over a grand in wine sitting there, but to me, the pen blanks in the foreground are worth much more! :D

Cheers!

[George Conklin]

Thanks again Dennis, I told you them Postal guys got it in for me :rolleyes:

What I need is some pen making kits, I've run out, I guess I'll have to order some :D

Maybe you might want to think about hookin up the postal guys with some of the pens you're going to make;) . You never know. It might improve your service:D .

[Andy Hoyt]

Probably get more mileage if you hook 'em up with the vino.

[Vaughn McMillan]

I got a similar box from Dennis a while back. Stu, it looks like you have a stick of curly koa in there. Save it for a good kit. ;) You won't be sorry.

Don't remember if I did it publicly, but many thanks, Dennis!

- Vaughn

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

Heck, half of the stuff I don't even know what it is :o:D

[Dennis Peacock]

Yea....Stu has a piece or two of Curly Koa as well as Chechen, Bubinga, Curly Maple, Padauk, and etc. :)

[Bob Weisner]

2 months????:eek: :eek: :eek: I thought things that get mailed overseas get sent by airmail .

[Jean Holland]

Two months....I thought Indiana had the worst postal service. I've gotten mail that took about 6 weeks. I guess Japan has us beat.

Nice looking wood...have fun turning it.

[Bob Weisner]

UPS would have had it there in 4 or 5 days.

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

We did a blank exchange, we wanted to keep costs down, so we sent the packages surface.

The problem is with the Japanese Post Office, they have me on a black list of some kind. ALL of my package mail gets stopped and opened. I should have told Dennis to send the stuff to my wife or one of my daughters, using the L shop's address, my mistake.

You see once they held up a large shipment of Humidors I ordered from the US, the guy in the US put "Cigar Boxes/Humidors" on the shipping invoice. The customs guys at the PO thought there were boxes of cigars in the shipment, they opened every single box in the shipments (like 48) and they did so in a manner that left the boxes kind of wreaked. Then they called me down to the main PO to explain myself. I admit it, I got angry and I yelled at them, they caused me a lot of trouble and damage to my product, which they are not responsible for fixing :mad:, because they did not know what a "Humidor" was, I suggested that they buy a dictionary, but I said it in less than a diplomatic way :rolleyes:

Since then, I have had trouble with packages being stopped and opened.

I'm just glad that the stuff got here, as the wood is so nice!

Thanks again Dennis!

Cheers!

[Mark Rios]

Is there a way to send you stuff under a different name or address to try and fool the evil Yakuza mail carriers?

[Brett Baldwin]

Maybe if you put "Nothing Important. Please Ignore" on it they will let it through.:rolleyes: Or maybe have the sender address it in Kanji so they don't flag it!;)

[Stu Ablett in Tokyo Japan]

Having it sent to the L shop (across the street) with my wife or my kid's name on it would work.

I went a good year without this problem, but in the last six months or so, it has returned, which really makes me think it is a specific person that got rotated back to the regional office that handles my mail.

I'll never know, and there is no way to fight city hall.

About 3 years ago, when this first happened, my wife and I went to the local post office, we took in nearly a dozen packages that had all been opened by Japan Post (They use special "Japan Post" tape to re-seal the packages) we pointed out that the last dozen parcels to be delivered to our house, EVERY SINGLE one got opened, they were things like bike parts, wood working tools, and kids B-day presents, not exactly contraband, and half were from companies (like Lee Valley) the other half were from family, but they were all opened, and all delayed 2 to 4 weeks because of it. The Local Post office guys, who we have a good relationship with (we sell stamps at our shop, as well as collect parcels for the post office to pick up daily) were dumbfounded, they could not explain it, but they said they would look into it, we got a call from the customs section of Japan Post basically saying we should not accuse them of mishandling the mail........... they did not say "Or Else" but my wife, who took the phone call said that the implications were there.

it is simple, I've POed some cog in the bureaucratic wheel somewhere, and that person is exercising their tiny bit of power over me in the childish way, and there is not one thing I can do about it, as Japan Post denies there is any problem.

Fun eh? :D