So the order I waited six weeks for came today. Forty kilos of smalti, half of it a blue I had made specially, a deep thing I paid extra for because I needed it for the water in the big panel. The courier leaves it at the taverna three doors down, because apparently "Dimitra" and "Dimitris" are the same person when you are in a hurry.

I find this out at four in the afternoon when Nikos calls me laughing so hard he can barely speak. The boxes are stacked by his freezer. He has already opened one. He says the blue is very nice and would look good on his wall.

Now I have to go and carry forty kilos of stone back down the street in the heat, in front of everyone having their coffee, and listen to the same joke about twenty times. And the worst part, honestly, is that I cannot even be properly angry with him because he is going to give me a free plate of something and I will say thank you.

Also the blue is fine. It is not what I wanted, but it is fine. I will make it work. That is the thing nobody tells you about this job, half of it is not being an artist, it is logistics and being nice to people who ruin your day by accident.