Things Come in Threes

Good Morning Campers! I apologize for the long absence from posting, it's been a hard few weeks. Thank you to everyone who has sent me private condolences on the death of my father. I will be writing to you all individually, I have just been too overwhelmed up to now. This post is for Dee (even though she already knows the contents as she is right here--we're sharing a room in Philadelphia).

It's that time of year again and we're gearing up for this weekend's Buyer's Market of American Craft 2001 part 1 (part 2 is in Baltimore in July). The past 28 hours have already been an exciting rollercoaster ride--Here's to the hope that the rest of the show isn't "Interesting Times" too. The title of today's post about things coming in threes refers to studio disasters coming in threes, as so far this morning I have had to fix three doozies.

Disaster #1: Right before I left for Philly yesterday, the studio phone rang and it was a woman who wanted more information about the DealSwarm offer. Umm, the offer wasn't supposed to go live yesterday, it was supposed to go live today. Today when the studio is open so we can answer the phone calls from people with questions about the deal (we were closed yesterday as we were open Monday for Valentine's Day). Today when I have an article about our website clarifying the deal details. Today when we are ready. NOT Yesterday! the article is up, Judy is in and answering the phone, we'll see what we can do.

Disaster #2: I noticed this morning that my bank reversed a $3,000 check I deposited in my account on Monday. The check was from one of my business accounts to another so I know it was good. When I called to ask what had happened (I have checks to my vendors and service providers out against that money), I was told that there was "an erasure" on the check so the ATM rejected it. I miswrote the first letter on the payee line, crossed it out, initialed it, and wrote the rest of the check out fine. The ATM took it, credited me, and then a day later (apparently without a real person seeing the check) spit it back out. When I called to find out how they were going to fix the error, I was told I would have to wait for the check to arrive in the mail and then I could redeposit it. I very reasonably and extremely forcefully explained that I am in Philadelphia, it was their error, I do NOT want checks bouncing from Atlanta to Athens, and they needed to fix it. With Capital One or Wachovia/Wells Fargo I would now be in a serious frustrated huff and planning to move all my accounts to another bank. But the thing I love best about Chase is their customer service. They have given me a provisional credit for the check and when I get back to Atlanta and the check arrives in the mail, I can take it to the bank for re-depositing. Business will go on as usual.

Disaster #3: The question fields on the Date Night Reservation form on the web all got overwritten with a customer's data. So instead of seeing "Date Requested" you would see a date. Instead of being asked for your name, you would be told someone else's name. And worst of all, instead of having to read and acknowledge our cancellation, clothing and other policies, you would just see the word "yes". It took some time, but I got that straightened out too.

Now it's time to have some food, get to the show, and start setting up. Can we finish today? I sure hope so...