Forgiveness & Explanation

I am writing today to ask your forgiveness for the lack of content posted here over the last week. May I just say that I’ve been exhausted, mentally and physically, and couldn’t bear the thought of attempting to write anything except one very short grocery list. To begin with – and as you’ll probably remember – I’ve been planning two very large events at my office; and, as I haven’t been very forthcoming with details on these events, I’ll give them to you now. The company I work for, Brink’s Home Security, has grown to over 1,000,000 customers! That being said, the main call center that handles all incoming and outgoing Customer Care calls as well as the Monitoring of home alarms and dispatch of emergency services just plain got too small to handle the volume of calls and alarms. Enter Knoxville, TN and the new National Customer Contact Center that works seamlessly with the original National Service Center in Irving, TX. The NCCC is a brand new building whose construction was completed in late March/ early April of this year. I’ve been planning the Grand Opening/Ribbon Cutting event for all the local big-wigs, including the Knox County Mayor, some local officials, the Knoxville Area Chamber Partnership, local business owners and members of the Knoxville Chamber, AND the Chairman and CEO of The Brink’s Company, Michael T. Dan and the President of Brink’s Home Security, Bob Allen. There were also a host of other Brink’s executives here for the big day. Needless to say there was much more involved than stretching a ribbon across the front door, snapping a few pictures with people grinning for all they’re worth, cutting the ribbon and shouting, “Yay!” I’ll not go into details of what all was involved, but we sent out 100 invitations, organized give-aways (mini-flash lights and the like), put together a gift for the Mayor, received RSVPs, called people we had not received RSVPs from so we could get a head-count to the caterer, organized vendors, floral arrangements, photographer, videographer, etc… (I’m gasping for breath just reliving it all.) That’s not to mention the four times we switched the head-count on the poor caterer; they were WONDERFUL, though, and deserve the highest recommendation I can give. Oh, and organized guided tours of the building, instructed parking attendants, pressure washed the parking lot (we hired out for this…can you imagine me running around in my heels pressure washing the parking lot?), made sure the landscapers had watered the plants, cut and trimmed the grass etc... Anyway – it was a big deal indeed and went off without a hitch! Oh – and when I say we, I mean I. There were other people involved, and I certainly don’t want to give the impression that I did it ALL myself, but if it makes you feel better, I’ll definitely take the credit!!! That event was on Wednesday, June 28th. Then, on July 1st, we had our Family Day Carnival Event. I planned this one, too. We had four inflatable games including a Wacky Shack, a 29 foot slide with a vicious T-Rex and a Kong-like gorilla in fierce battle, a ball-crawl for the little ones, and something called a Tiger Belly Bouncer which was essentially an enclosed trampoline shaped like a tiger cub on its back; pretty cute. There were also hot dogs, sno-cones, cotton candy, give-aways, a raffle, a couple police cruisers, (the fire engine didn’t show up), face-painting clowns, cookie decorating, a golf challenge and more! It was great and I think everyone had a wonderful time. So I had two very large events within 3 days then had Sunday, Monday (generously offered by my boss and gladly taken by me) & Tuesday off. Kiddo’s “Gammy”, as he calls her, came for the Family Day event from Greenville, SC by bus on Friday. That was an almost 10-hour ordeal for her and I felt obligated to offer to drive her back; though I actually really wanted to go spend some more time with her so obligation was not really the issue. We drove down on Sunday right after church and got there about 6:00 PM. (Boy – did we luck out in the traffic department; there wasn’t much of it at all!) While in SC, we saw my sister, her husband, their adorable daughter, and a few other family members, met Gammy’s neighbor and her menagerie (5 cats, two of which are kittens, 3 dogs, two of which are tiny Pomeranians. She came over one morning just after bathing them and they both had on little pink satin bathrobes with pink fur trim - strange that I would think that kind of doggie abuse was cute, but I did.), did some running around in the back yard, spent some quality time with Gammy and generally had a nice visit. Then it was time to drive home. We left Tuesday morning around 10:00 and got home around 2:00. (Again, hardly any traffic!) Kiddo slept most of the way home (an almost 4 hour trip), woke up raring to go, spent some time in his kiddie-pool, got prune fingers and couldn’t figure out if they hurt or just looked weird (yeah, not a fan of wrinkly fingers), went to bed at 7:30 and got up around 8:00 this morning. I’m back at work and attempting to readjust to life post-events and sitting here scratching my head wondering which pile of neglected paperwork to attack first. I guess filing wins because it’s the bigger stack and has been calling to me longer! Anyway – hope everyone had a wonderful 4th! Happiness & fireworks to all! TTFN JMS