March 31, 2017
Dear Everyone:
This has been a very busy week for me.
We had our “Records and Information Management (RIM) Symposium
for City Clerks” yesterday; and may I say that it was a resounding
success.
Over 40 people signed up and better than most of them actually came.
You can count on at least a few to get sick, or have some work at
the office that just can’t wait, or something.
But you can’t count on them to stay away when you’re planning for
the free food. Or making
copies of handouts, etc.
The City Clerk for
San Ramon, “Rebecca”, supplied coffee and cups,
plastic ware, plates and so on in the morning.
She even went out and got grapes, which she cut into little
bunches, and tangerines. And
bagels. In the meantime, I
picked up croissants and pastries.
I know this will come as a shock to certain members of this family, but
not everyone drinks coffee.
So I picked up some fruit juices and “Rebecca” included a plentiful
supply of little water bottles.
That took care of breakfast.
For lunch, I decided to do “bagged” lunches.
We had a large group of people in a relatively small space, and a
limited amount of time. We
didn’t want to have folks spend half the “lunch break” standing in line
at any kind of buffet.
Instead, they could each grab a bag and a cold soft drink, fruit juice,
or another water bottle, and take it back to their seat, or go outside
on the patio to eat.
We needed over three dozen sandwiches.
When I met with “Rebecca” do discuss all these plans, she asked
if I was going to have them made at
Safeway.
To be honest, the thought hadn’t entered my head; but as soon as
she said it, I thought, “Of course!”
It reminds me of a wedding I attended many, many decades ago.
A few days before the Big Day, the caterer suddenly couldn’t
complete the project. The
mother-of-the-bride called the local Safeway bakery department.
“Do you do wedding cakes?”
“Of course!”
“Can you have one ready by this Saturday?”
“How big do you want it?”
It was a lovely, multi-layer cake with a tiny working fountain in the
middle of it. I was
impressed.
So on Tuesday I went to my local Safeway and we figured out the best
combination of sandwiches to have ready for yesterday.
That evening I used the template for my return address labels to
create little labels reading, “Roast Beef”, “Chicken”, “Turkey” and so
on.
Meanwhile, I had gone to a local “craft” supply store and found some
brightly-colored paper gift bags of the right size, complete with little
cord handles. Wednesday
afternoon, I placed a generous-sized paper napkin and single-serving bag
of chips, and a plastic snack bag with cookies in each bag.
Then I loaded them all in very large shopping bags.
And the sheet of labels for what kind of sandwich each bag would
contain.
And the juices. And the soft
drinks. And the handouts.
And the name badges.
And a whole lot of other things.
Took them all to
City Hall before they closed at 5:00 PM.
They even had a couple of refrigerators that could hold all the
juices and soft drinks so they would be cold the next day.
Then I spent time Wednesday evening folding
ARMA Chapter
brochures.
Thursday morning, nearly everything was ready when I got to City Hall
just as they opened at 8:00 am.
There were already a lot of people there, including my first
Speaker, “Paris”. I gave a
brief introduction and we were off and running.
While the second Speaker, “Stevie” was giving her presentation, I jumped
in the car, drove to Safeway and picked up all the sandwiches.
I missed most of “Stevie’s” remarks as I was in the next room,
compiling lunch bags with help from “Rebecca’s” very capable assistant.
Grab a bag, shove in a sandwich.
Peel the corresponding label from the sheet and place it on the
front of the bag. Throw in a
trifold brochure and place the now-completed lunch bag on the table.
Move on to the next one.
It all went like clockwork.
Lunch was ready right on time.
And “Rebecca” told me later that she got quite a few compliments
on the lunches. I even saw
some people carefully fold the now-empty bag in with their handouts,
notes and so on as they got ready to leave.
Oh, and they really liked the educational part of the sessions, which
was the actual point, after all.
Love, as always,
Pete
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