Bites and Pieces

Read about some completely outrageous and funny things that have happened at shows.

After closing up at 6:00, we stopped by a grocery store in Mount Shasta to pick up some more drinks. I looked for some lemonade (ready-made from the frig area) and couldn't locate any. I asked one of the employees where the lemonade was located (they had about 50 brands of Orange Juice) and he said that they had none and he was hoping that the truck would bring some tomorrow. I looked at him. "I'm not waiting until tomorrow." This ain't one of those things where you are waiting in line for days to get tickets for a great event or pick up a new game machine. Can you imagine 200 people standing in line at 5:00AM waiting for the place to open so they can get some lemonade. Only two per customer please. Oh man. I gotta go to the bathroom, can you hold my spot for me? Hey dude, back of the line, I've been here since yesterday morning.

So we paid for our things and decided to drop by the smaller grocery store in Weed. All they had was the 'Paul Newman' lemonade, so I picked up a couple containers. Got back to the motel, got some ice and drank away. It was good and refreshing. It has it's own special 'twang' to it. I guess that I had gotten a little dehydrated.

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E      HOW TIME FLIES. I was just thinking back to the first time that I ever saw an Arts and Crafts Show or Festival. I recall a trip to Vancouver back around 1980 I took with my family. Beautiful area and I have always enjoyed B.C., Alberta and Alaska on our trips to the North. Anyway, I actually stumbled across their 'Seafair' back then and I saw an area with many canopies along with people selling their items. I don't recall much about the booths in general, but I thought it was pretty neat. During the 1980's I saw a number of Art and Wine Festivals in our City of Hayward but we didn't start doing events until 1993. And the rest is history.

BLOCKED OUT IN CASTRO VALLEY
Each year during the second weekend of September we participate in the Castro Valley Fall Festival. For a number of years, they had the event in the parking lots of Castro Village and I was located on the west end close to Starbuck's. Perhaps it was 5-6 years ago when I arrived at 6:00am to find a car parked in one of the spaces opposite the booth two spaces away. It was parked width-wise and sticking out 2/3 ways across the aisle where people would be walking. Of course, there was a 'no parking' sign in the area, but the owner of the car had parked there early Friday evening. This vehicle obstructed passage for a number of vendor's vehicles in the morning. I guess that it was around 8:30 when the police arrived and were preparing to tow it away. They checked the license number and were able to contact the the owner of the vehicle.   Shortly after, another vehicle pulled up and a 22-23 year old blonde (blonde? Yah... now I see) haired lady stepped out of that car which was driven by a male counterpart who obviously this lady spent the night with. Turned out that this (lady) person's father was a 'friend' of a certain policeman. A policeman there did mention to her that he had called her dad about the car. She was somewhat embarassed as she apologized and walked over to the car and drove away. So, as it happened, this lady met the guy at the 'village' and the two of them left in the guy's car, leaving the other car behind. Why did she meet the guy there? Maybe didn't want mommy and daddy to know about her 'date'? Perhaps she told her mother she was going over to a g-friend's house?

HOW ABOUT A WEEKEND AT LAKE CHANDLER?



March 2006, Chandler, AZ Must be close to the beach because loads of sand kicks up whenever a vehicle passed by. Great hookups... 5 water hoses attached to a spigot; a bunch of electrical plugs connected to a junction box.    Listen to the rides of the carnival until late at night and food vendors blasting their loud music when they get up at 3:00AM. No respect for the vendors who were up late at night. Did this show for two years and will never return. Only $100 for three nights. People...this is what it looked like Sunday morning around noontime after they had pumped out some of the water and they began laying and spreading the hay. That was a mess. The rain stopped around 5:00AM, but too wet and ugly to go out there and take some unbelieveable photos. The water was much deeper than you see....maybe two feet deep in some areas. Our booth was a mess.



Did they have 150,000 people at the Newark Days Celebration in Newark, CA on September 22-23, 2007? That's what they claim.    Actually, since there were probably around 30,000 people there, I am worried about the 120,000 people that are missing. No earthquakes.....couldn't have lost them there. Where's Waldo? Remember him? Maybe we can find him? No hurricanes....no tsunami's.....no sinkholes.. I GUESS JUST PLAIN OL' MISSING right off the face of the earth. They said that they get 150,000 for the event, but I couldn't find them? I looked under tries, in the porta-potties, behind buildings, all over the place.

                          VENDORS NOT TRAVELING FAR!!

Apr 26-27 Cupertino, CA That's what appears is happening. I was at the Cupertino Cherry Blossom Festival this past weekend and we were missing a number of vendors. I don't think that vendors are traveling long distances to participate in events, as they attempt to cut expenses. The gas prices have taken their toll as they sail past $4.00. In the future, we can expect to see less vendors at a lot of events and quite possibly, promoters 'getting desperate' for vendors?

Not sure, but it could happen. In the past the 'shadiest promoters' were able to get vendors quite simply as everybody was desperate to find money-making events. I have cut out a number of our shows where we had to 'motel it' and reduce our expenses. I am willing to try more 'local shows' these days.

                UPS CAUSES VENDOR TO GO POSTAL

Yes...that is true. I am the one that went 'postal' and you should too. Having dealt with years of problems and bull crap from the entire UPS beaurocracy, I highly encourage all to go postal. I have had a great number of my packages destroyed by UPS, broken into and delayed for long periods of time.

Management has been quite rhetorical in conversations and are a bunch incompetent liars. I am on a route where I get my packages just before their closing time of 7:00 and since I am a business, I would like to get things earlier.

        ALWAYS SOME KIND OF PROBLEM AT MOTEL 6

On-going problems with Motel-6.   Being a vendor, we have to take advantage of the reasonable rates that this chain of motels offers. Needing to keep costs down, we have to select motels that are inexpensive. I know a lot of vendors that sleep in their van and trucks and that isn't for me. So choose to stay at Motel 6. In December, we stayed at the one located at: 960 S Freeway I-10 at Congress Street, Exit #258 (Tucson).Getting there was half the fun. I-10 construction blocked off many exits in the area and we had to go quite far out of our way to just get off the highway. While at the motel, we (along with many other visitors) were unable to sleep at night because the pipes were clanging ALL NIGHT LONG.