Monday, November 24, 2008

The Last Post Mortem of the Year

Hi I'm back.

No more shows this year. I'm FINISHED. Actually, there might be one more, but I'm not really into it. We'll see how I feel closer to the time.

The weekend was interesting. We've been in big craft shows before, but this was a GIFT AND CRAFT SHOW. Which meant shitloads of Kountry Krafts...snowmen and Santas on sticks, 'handpainted' winter scenes on shingles, wreaths, swags, and any manner of faux vegetation to spiff up your home for the holidays. And Kountry style gingham quilts, patchwork this, primitive that, oh goodness there was a lot of stuff there.

I'm so freaking glad it's over.

We didn't do badly, considering. Nobody seemed to be doing very well. The man next to us (who was caught sleeping, and spent a long time talking on his little Blootooth headset every day) did not make his booth space. The lady next door (with a huge selection of patchwork quilts, and other textile-ish goodness) had a hotel room for two nights, and two spaces, did not make booth either. So by our unerring cheapness (I drove back home Saturday night instead of hoteling it) and rocks, we managed to make a few bucks.

The promoter for this show is big time, and she's a large, loud lady who takes no shit. Considering that this thing broke down like this: 230 vendors, 6,000 shoppers, dozens of volunteers, three charity groups, eight golf carts (to ferry shoppers from the lots to the hall) fifty thousand flyers printed and handed out (yes, fifty thousand) sixteen different newspaper ads, radio and TV ads,and a big ass space that nobody has ever been to. She can be a little loud, and takes no shit. On Saturday, a woman vendor had issue with the fact that this show was touted as "Handmade" but there were LOTS of buy/sell stuff (Buy/sell is the thorn in the side of us hand crafters, but sometimes it's for the better) Anyway, this lady was PISSED, and had a big yelling match with the promoter. Eventually she calmed down, and went on about her business.

The promoter was already at DefCon 3, because some vendors had dropped their trailers in parking areas meant for shoppers. The rules were clear, and there were LOTS of signs directing us where to park. She announced several times that they had to move their rigs, but the rigs were not moved, and the promotor was not amused. So Sunday morning, she did the parking announcement again, sounding VERY pissed. After 25 minutes, they were still parked in the spots, and she came on the PA again and stated that she was not going to open the doors to the show until the offending trailers were moved. Which was uncool, and pissed off a whole BUNCH of vendors. Much grumbling and whining ensued, and eventually all but one trailer was moved. The shoppers were let in, and the event went on.

You must understand that there was 230 vendors in this hall, and for the most part we were all bored out of our skulls, so any kind of information passed thru the hall like wildfire. The word came back to us that the promoter and another vendor were jawing at each other, and the vendor was really up in the promoter's face. The promoter shut him down. Literally. Dragged six folding chairs and set them up in front of his booth with big yellow signs 'THIS BOOTH IS CLOSED', and stood over the guy as he packed his shit up and left. Ugly, ugly.

A couple hours later, down the row from us there was a disturbance, and wonder of wonders, there was the promoter AND the EMT's AND the Campus cops AND the local cops.
Apparently, the lady from the previous day took this opportunity to give the Promoter hell all over again about the buy/sell and then claimed the Promoter wacked her with her cane.

WHOT?!!

Weeping and wailing, this broad was taken out by the EMT's on a stretcher, while the EMT's rolled their eyes and snickered. Apparently this lady's cheese had slid off the cracker awhile back. Even though she was screaming at the top of her lungs that she was filing assault charges against the promoter for the alleged cane wacking.

This story strikes me as odd. Why would a person who had this whole show (and the 25 years of history with it) at stake smack some woman with her cane over something like buy/sell issues? Stooopid. But this was the talk of the day. More buzzing from booth to booth about what had gone down.

At the end of the day, the promoter got on the PA for the last time, and gave some long and winding speech thanking everyone who got her this far, and who was responsible for the success of the show. It was a long speech. The guy next to us kept saying, "Get the hook!!" She finished up her ramble by saying, "I might be in jail tomorrow, but I'll be back next year, I'm not taking anyone's crap!" At which we all cheered, partly because we were glad she was done.

Obbie was tickled because he saw the real life, live human version of this guy:




Crossed arms and all. "Git your shit and git out!" The guy was Walters real life twin. He didn't get a picture though, but this guy probably wouldn't have been happy about that either.

So all in all it was a good weekend. We had dinner with big Momma on Saturday, and I was delirous. TGIFridays is an armpit of a restaurant, and I will NEVER EVER go into one again. Awful, horrible food. Never again.

Besides that, I was so tired and delirous on Saturday that I was going to faint, and Obbie went thru the same thing on Sunday. Weirdness. But overall we had a good weekend. I'm glad we did this show, and I thank GOD that I'm smart enough to keep my day job, and not make krafting my kareer. Oh. Hell. No.

Oh, and the Pro Pay credit card thing works pretty cool. I'll let you know more on the 27th if the money is in my account like it's supposed to.

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