April 18, 1991
Dear Everyone:
It’s hard to stay made at someone who gives you
money.
The third Wednesday of every month (except July and
sometimes November, depending on where Thanksgiving lands) is reserved
for the ARMA Monthly Workshop and Dinner Meeting.
ARMA is the Association of Records Managers and Administrators.
Since “Ashley” is the current Chapter President of
the local, Golden Gate, chapter and “Alma” is a past president of the
Houston chapter (which call themselves the ARMAdillos and isn’t that too
cute for words?), and since all but one of us in Company’s Records
Management are members, we tend to spend a lot of time on ARMA.
This creates a slight conflict of conscience for me
personally as I regard ARMA as a complete waste of time.
However, since “Alma” put “participate in ARMA” as a means of
“increasing job knowledge”, time we will waste.
Every month, people call in reservations for the
Workshop and Dinner to a PC that “Ashley” set up in the copy room.
The PC runs a software called “Big Mouth” which answers the
phone, spits out pre-recorded messages and instructions, and records
answers. Every month,
“Rowena” calls “Big Mouth” and picks up the recorded reservation.
This month, because “Rowena” was going to be going
on a business trip, I offered to take the reservations for her.
This is something I’ve done before and I think, in the future,
we’ll probably trade off on a monthly basis.
It goes something like this:
You call “Big Mouth” and, because the phone is in the next room,
you hear it ring in stereo.
Conversely, if the line is busy, you know it before you get the busy
signal, because you don’t hear it ring next door.
Then you go through a series of touch tone keys to get to the
Reservations Mail Box.
At this point you get a series of answers:
“Joe Smith (bong!) S-M-I-T-H (bong!) City of Berkeley (bong!)
415-555-1234 (bong!) Yes (bong!) No (bong!) Yes (bong!) (slight
hesitation) London Broil (bong!) Yes, please.”
Then “Big Mouth” gives you a series of options as to what to do
with the message.
You can see what’s happening, of course.
You get the answers, but “Big Mouth” doesn’t tell you what the
questions are. You have to
know in advance: “Please
state your name (bong!)
Please spell you name (bong!) Are you a member of ARMA? (bong!)
Is this your first time?
(bong!) Are you
attending the Dinner?
(bong!) Are you attending
the Workshop? (bong!)
Please state your dinner selection (bong!)
Do you need a receipt?
(bong!)
It’s like a video game.
Can you type out I-R-O-N M-O-U-N-T-A-I-N before the caller starts
rattling off their phone number?
Can you figure out how to spell Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe”
when what you’re hearing sounds like “Partridge in a Pear Tree”?
People have until the Friday before the dinner to
get their reservations in, but there’s always somebody who’s late, so we
charge them an extra $5.00.
Usually “Rowena” and I take care of Registration
before the Workshop and Dinner.
We use a colored highlighter to mark people’s names as they come
in and cheerfully accept their money, giving pre-written receipts as
requested. Once the Workshop
“rush” is over at 4:00, we have a quiet time before the dinner crowd
shows up for the Social Hour 5:30-6:30.
This is usually the time that the subject of strawberry daiquiris
comes up. This is one of the
advantages of doing Registration:
You get a jump on Social Hour.
Sometimes “Rowena” does Registration alone.
Sometimes I do. But
one month, neither one of us could make it.
And the Program Director, “Ron”, the guy who arranges for the
restaurant, menu and guest speakers, had to handle Registration by
himself. Apparently, it was
something of a revelation for him.
Last night, I went through the usual:
Taking cash and checks and recording them on the reservation
list. Reminding people who
couldn’t remember what they ordered.
Arranging for a “Blackened Red Snapper” to change her order to
“London Broil” at the last minute.
Giving people little “Post-It’s with “B”, “C” or “F” on them to
indicate their entrée (Beef, Chicken or Fish) which we place next to our
plates so the servers don’t have to ask who gets what.
After dinner, before the guest speaker starts, some
member of the board makes a few announcements.
At this point, I saw “Victoria” getting up to leave.
She couldn’t stay for the presentation.
“Victoria” is the new Treasurer, the previous Treasurer having
been requested to resign in return for not pressing charges (seems he
got the ARMA treasury a little confused with his personal checking
account). I needed to give
her the envelope full of money and the reservation list showing who
showed up and who didn’t.
As I was explaining to her what was what, I heard
my name ring out. “Ron” was
asking me to come up to the podium.
It seems that he was so impressed with how much goes into
reservations/registration that he and the board decided to give me an
award. Usually, if there’s
going to be an award, I know about it before anyone else because
“Ashley” has me hand-letter the Certificate with my calligraphy pens.
But this time, of course, they had someone else do it.
Along with the Certificate came a nice little Macy’s box that
turned out to contain a gift certificate worth
50 bucks!
I was so knocked out by it that I completely forgot
about “Victoria”. She had to
come over to my seat to find out if she had everything she needed.
This morning, I found out from “Clara” that they
had already given a similar award to “Rowena”, but that they hadn’t been
able to arrange it for a night that we were both there.
They also asked everyone to keep quiet about it so it would be a
surprise. “Clara” said,
“They didn’t know what they were asking!”
Which is one way of saying no one in this group can keep a
secret.
So… now I have a tough decision to make:
Should I go out and spend the money this weekend, or wait until
“Rowena” comes back on Monday so we can go shopping together?
This, of course, does not alter my contention that
ARMA is a waste of time.
Just the same, I suppose I’ll go on taking reservations and telling
people what they wanted for dinner.
Love, as always,
Pete
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