I find myself compulsively checking the cabin camera just to look at it because it instantly brings my blood pressure down just thinking about the desert. There was a massive rainstorm out there that washed out roads all through Mojave and Death Valley - a “thousand year storm” they called it, in which a year’s worth of rain fell in one hour. The H and I both watched it on our security cameras. It was wild. I watched the shipping container and expected it to slowly drift away, but it didn’t. The wash right behind our place was full and flowing for about 24 hours. I don’t think there was any damage to our place, but it’s hard to know for sure. I got the number of a highly recommended handyman out there from a FB group, but determined in a phone call that he’s too expensive for us. So, it’s back to waiting until the neighbor gets back in December. Sigh. At least we can get *some* camping in in the fall before it gets too cold at night. I have a trip planned for end of next month with tickets bought to an astronomy festival at a neighboring observatory. I’m counting the days.
In the meantime I’m engaged in complex constant decision making all day every day, which I’ve now learned is tough on our brains and was exacerbated by the pandemic. I find myself cranky and exhausted by the constant judgement calls. And I’m at that unpleasant part of the event where a) registrations are once again slow as molasses as I just raised the prices, and I don’t know if it’ll pick up again, and b) people are starting to have to cancel (thankfully normal stuff, not covid related), so that every day I’m getting about five refunds to one or two people signing up, which totally sucks. It’s normal and nothing to be concerned about, but…it sucks. The budget is, as always, spiraling out of control (I think I’ve agreed to at least $10,000 in unexpected extra expenses in the last two days) and I’m worried about money. I have no idea how this is all going to shake out.
But one thing on my side is the fact that the event will happen, and I don’t have to worry about if the hotel will let me out of my contract or not since I’ve met my obligation, there will be income, people are excited about it, my staff is all in place, and in a blink of an eye it’ll be over. This time last year I was issuing refunds all day. This doesn’t feel better than that, but it is. And as far as covid stuff, everyone’s over it - I don’t get a feeling of much interest on either side; people are sick of talking about it and just want to get together and have fun, no matter what that looks like. I’m not as worried as I was about being sued or having some ugly confrontation at registration - I think both of those things are very unlikely at this point. If there’s one thing I know about event planning, it’s that the thing you think is going to be The Big Problem never actually is - it’s always some other thing you never could have anticipated.
Boys are rounding out their final week at camp. Friday I have the annual fun of heading up to the school to look at the kids’ class lists to see which of their friends are in their classes; I have all their supplies and new backpacks; we’re ready to roll.
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