I watch Law and Order CI and sip a perky white graves and listen to my mother snoring genteelly in the other bed... No wait, that was two nights ago. Tonight I slug down a sauvignon blanc straight from the bottle and listen to the printer spit out catalog pages on glossy brochure paper. I am going to set one more job to print and then it will be my turn to shower and crash. Here are some highlights of the show so far (from notes I have put in over the past couple of days):
Wednesday, February 15, 3:20 pm.
We had made it through the first day. And it went surprisingly well! Against all odds, expectations and scheduled move-in time, the carpet is down in the booth, the braces are all installed across the top of the booth to hang the track lights from and we have unloaded the van. Today they are supposed to install the foam core walls first thing and then we will finish setting up the booth and I will make the catalog and print out a bunch in the room tonight. Nothing like saving things till the last minute! On the plus side, I did get a site meter installed on my home page this morning so I can track the traffic I get from the show. I plan to hand out oodles of postcards and the first place the people picking them up will go (I hope) is the website. It would be nice if I had it were done, but you can't have everything.
Thursday, February 16, 8:30 am.
I sit with baited breath (really, I haven't brushed yet. At least it's not baited coffee breath) waiting for the contract negotiator from the Publisher to call me. I broke down and wrote her last night as it has been over a week since I wrote and I have heard nothing back concerning my contract issues. The phone rings!...
...and we are on. We have come to if not total agreement, at least understanding on all points under discussion in the contract. They could still screw me--the contract is heavily skewed in their favor--but at least now I have a comfort level that they won't. The only fly in the ointment right now is that they want final copy by August 15. My husband assures me that I "churn it out over a long weekend". Is he high?!? Where did he get drugs like that? I think I am not going to be able to be comfortable with that one and it is going to have to go. I can do 8/15 as a stretch goal, but not as an expectation. Now off to finish setting up for the show!
Friday, February 16, 3:30pm.
IT'S DONE!!! I am finally all set-up and ready. Notice the time above. The show started at 10:00 am. I tempted the gods by writing about things going well the day before yesterday and I was severely punished. Exhibitor Services didn't get the walls in my booth up until 3:30 yesterday afternoon *23-1/2hours after they told me they would be done*... that isn't a typo or an extra digitr in the number. They were just shy of a full day late. It was a nightmare, I had wine with lunch to get over it.
There was not much I could do until the walls got up so Mom and I had to stay and work until 10:30 pm. We got all the glass up, and then we came back to the room and I worked on my catalog till 1:00 am. Then back up at 7:00 am today to print some more pages out (they had to be turned over and sent back through the printer so I couldn't just load it all last night). Some of the buyer's today were a bit cranky that I didn't have my work priced for the first four hours. In fact I ended up redoing my price list entirely and changing some of the prices after I handed out some catalog packets (with price lists in them)... Oh well, if anyone I gave a now obsolete price list to comes back and orders from me tomorrow, I'll give him the lowest price from either price list (some prices went up, some went down--I just needed to simplify!).
And I already have two orders! They are not big, but they are new galleries and one of them is in a new state for me--New Jersey! I need to get my gallery map up on my website. Priority, priority, priority (after BMAC orders, commissions and the book...).
And Kathleen Hogan from Chicago's One of a Kind Show and Sale stopped by my booth to drop off a few applications postcards that they are sending out for the show. My work is on the front of the postcard!!
Friday, February 17, 10:43 pm.
So the weary road warrior goes to bed. It was a long day, but a good one and there will be real sleep tonight. The printer sings its lullaby with my mother's delicate snores providing high notes in harmony.
2 comments:
Bravo! Hang in there; by this time next week you'll be drinking wines at a California winery!
Part of my lameness is expressed through my inabilty to know what day it is... I was finally ready by Friday afternoon--over four hours after the show started. Oh well. :-)
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