One of these days I’ll write a fascinating entry about addiction and obsession, but for now, I’ve got a side-story about it.

As many of you may suspect, I am a bit of a Sylvester McCoy fan. So I have a tendency to seek out things that he’s performed in and, if I can purchase it, I will. When I discovered that he’s gotten into reading children’s books, I was most delighted. His readings of Philip Ardagh’s Eddie Dickens Trilogy made me into an Ardagh fan. I was also able to buy his reading of Let’s Do the Pharaoh by Jeremy Strong. However. my luck in obtaining Big George, as written by Eric Pringle and read by Sylvester McCoy, has been nil. Couldn’t get the book from Amazon.co.uk or another UK online bookstore which listed it. So I went to the source. To Chivers Press.

Well, to tell the rest of this story, let me paste, for your enjoyment, the e-mail which I sent to Chivers today. (BTW, they are also known as Audio Book Collection and they’re located in Bath, UK.)

On 12 Feb 2004, I ordered the audio book BIG GEORGE from your company. On 20 Feb, US$30.13 was charged to my credit card by your company. However, I never did receive the item in question. A month later, I wrote an e-mail via your contact page regarding the lack of the audio tape. I was assured by Peter Royle that the parcel left the warehouse on 26 Feb and to wait another 10 days or so. I was given ref #227715 in that e-mail.

On 7 Apr 2004, I e-mailed Peter Royle to say that I had still not received the package. I asked what the next course of action was. He responded on the 20th to say he would send another. I confirmed the shipping address and waited yet again.

About the time I thought I should send another e-mail (that is, last week) I received a phone call from WorldNet Shipping which said that they had a package for me but to an address that was undeliverable. Rather odd as I have many packages delivered to my address, but I gave them my post office box number and that seemed to satisfy them. I was informed the item was an audio tape. I was excited – maybe I’d finally get the tape!

Well, today there was a package for me at the post office. Strangely enough, there were two addresses on it. Mine, obviously, but also a Mrs A Harmon of [address cut from LJ for privacy reasons]. I opened it on the spot to discover it was *not* BIG GEORGE as I had ordered but a 6-tape set of GREAT EXPECTATIONS. Argh!

So now, Mrs A Harmon is probably waiting on her set of GREAT EXPECTATIONS and may even have my BIG GEORGE. And I’m still without the original item that I ordered. Do you folks actually *have* BIG GEORGE? I see that it’s still listed in your catalog. Is there any way that I’ll be able to get it? Or will you refund my money? What should I do about the 6-tape set of GREAT EXPECTATIONS? Has Mrs A Harmon contacted you regarding a lost package yet?

I hope that someone will be able to help me out here. My main goal is to get the original tape that I ordered, but if that is an impossible task, I would like my US$30.13 back, please. Thank you.

*sigh* I’ll be interested to know what they’ll do next.