Crossing Them Off

I spent most of yesterday crossing chores of my To Do list, and even though we had a little setback, I actually got a lot accomplished. That’s always a good feeling.

The first order of business was to call some of the commercial mail services in the area to find one to handle mailing out the new issue of the Gypsy Journal. The first place I called was ridiculous, and two minutes into the phone call, I already knew it was a waste of time. The first thing they told me was that they charge a $25 “new customer fee” just to accept us as a customer. Not a deposit on services to be rendered, just a flat $25 to allow me the honor of being their customer. Darn, if the oil companies ever get wind of this scam, we’re really screwed!

I quickly moved on to the second company on my list, and just as quickly as I knew the first outfit wasn’t going to work, I knew this guy was somebody I could do business with. He understood exactly what we needed, he gave me a fair price right up front, and he didn’t even want to charge me a fee to take my money! What a way to do business.

With that done, I called our printer, back in Michigan, to confirm that the new issue had been printed on schedule and was picked up yesterday morning to begin its trip west. Well, not exactly. They had some kind of difficulty on their end, and the paper wasn’t on the truck. In fact, it wasn’t even printed yet! I was assured that it would be printed Monday evening, and on a truck bright and early this morning.

A one day delay doesn’t sound all that terrible, except for the fact that we originally were told that the papers would ship out Monday and arrive in Phoenix on Friday. Then we would have the weekend to stuff envelopes to get them mailed out next Monday. Now the shipment probably won’t even arrive until Monday, so we’ll actually be several days behind our planned schedule by the time it hits the post office. We had planned to leave for Yuma on the 23rd, but we may have to push that date back a day or two. Like I said, a little setback.

With that unpleasant news out of the way, the next order of business was to get T-shirts ordered for the upcoming Arizona Gypsy Gathering rally. To be honest, I wasn’t all that eager to order shirts this time around. After every rally, no matter how carefully we plan, we have unsold shirts left over, which we have to eat the cost of. Screen printers have minimum orders to get any kind of affordable pricing, and even when we have had people order their shirts ahead of time, we still have had to buy extras to make our minimum order, hoping that they would sell at the rally. But Miss Terry prevailed and said that we’d have a lot of disappointed people if we didn’t have rally shirts available. So I bit the bullet and told her to order them. We’ll see how it works out.

Okay, what’s next? Ah yes, our TV cabinet upgrades! Billy, from RV Renovators, had promised to come by yesterday afternoon to look at our existing cabinets and do some measuring, and unlike the awning repair guy who stood us up on Sunday, Billy arrived as promised. Gee, working with professionals who respect their customers is really cool!

I stayed out of the way while Miss Terry and Billy measured and planned and schemed and discussed, and then measured and discussed again. I’m not exactly sure what all of the details were, because I didn’t have a need to know. But the end result is that we may be taking the motorhome over to RV Renovators today for them to start the job. Gee, working with professionals really is cool! 

After Billy left, we ran to the post office to mail off some orders, ran a couple of errands, and then stopped at Terry’s parents to visit for a while. It completely slipped my mind to wish her dad happy birthday on Friday, when Pete turned 81, but here’s belated greetings to a fantastic man whom I have a tremendous amount of respect and affection for.

It being Valentine’s Day, what kind of jerk would I be if I didn’t take my pretty lady out to dinner at, where else, our favorite Chinese buffet! Oh, don’t even start! We both love the place, and could eat there every night. What’s that you say, who eats Chinese food every night? Well… Chinese people!

In fact, we go to #1 Eastern Super Buffet so often when we’re here that they actually have given me my very own Chinese name. When I waddled in the door past all the snowbirds, I heard one waitress tell another that I was Won Phat Gi. How cool is that? I feel like family! 🙂

Thought For The Day – I carry a gun because a cop is too heavy.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally