What a difference two weeks makes...Or does it?

When I made my first sale over a week ago, I was elated. I had this vision of myself surrounded by ingredients, Katy Perry (don't judge) blasting on the iPhone, and flour dust coming off of the counter in big, billowy clouds. I imagined orders coming in, me barely being able to fill them all. I imagined a lot of things. One thing I am trying to learn how to be is a perfect mix of optimistic and realistic. This has never been one of my strong suits, I am almost always overly optimistic and far from realistic when I get my heart set on something, which can be good or bad, depending on the situation. I hope it turns out to be good in this case.

I have been waiting for a shipment of a key ingredient for over two weeks. My Taobao ordering skills have improved, but I am still a novice. I use Taobao by navigating through it using the translate function on Google Chrome, and it works quite well, but it's not perfect. For example, items are referred to as "baby", as in "search for baby" or "I am concerned about the baby". Apparently I ordered a "baby" that is now stuck in customs as it was shipped from the U.S.

It's funny. In Shanghai so many things move at neck-breaking speed. Millions of people are hustling in every direction, entire businesses appear out of thin air, seemingly overnight. It takes about 15 minutes to get married (I know, I did it), and one second to almost get run over by a taxi (or a motor bike, or a bus, or an old lady at the market). When I began selling Serenity Seitan, I thought it would be the same way. I thought I would debut the product and be covered in seitan dough for the next week. Then reality hit. As much as this city teaches us how to move quickly, it also teaches it to be patient. In my experience, it almost always works out in the end.

I have my kitchen utensils ready, the labels are set, and the packaging ready to be cut. Thinking good thoughts, and hoping for the best, but expecting...reality.