Does anybody have some Advil?

Today at work was a really good day, aside from the fact that I had a headache that started around 10am and lasted until I got home from work around 5:15. Luckily Stacy had some pain meds and was gracious enough to share them with me. I worked on a couple of small projects for Kenny to provide our new Market Reps in the TN stores with flyers to distribute. I also printed out the 350 flyers for the Boys and Girls Club conference in Knoxville in March. I talked to Chris today and she wanted me to put together a flyer for the Knoxville store to promote TCAP test prep books. I put that together and am waiting for approval after a final proofing. I did do a lot more leg work on the sales flyer piece we are trying to produce in the next 2 weeks. Stay gave me a list of what will probably go on several of the pages of the flyer (Dave will authorize the final list of items) and I began collecting the graphics, cleaning them up, and typing out the product descriptions. I must admit that it is starting to look like a real flyer!

Not much happened at home tonight. I went and ran on the treadmill for about 20 minutes after eating some vegetarian vegetable soup for dinner. I watch the Lady Vols dominate Ole Miss in basketball and then decided to write on the blog and call it an early night so I would be rested for my drive to Knoxville tomorrow after work. I hope the wind dies down. I can hear it whistling in the trees outside my office window at the apartment. It is supposed to be cold here in the morning. Hopefully not cold enough to warrant wasting gas to heat-up and thaw out my car. Oh well, I will see you tomorrow night or Saturday, or if not then at least know I will be in town! Goodbye until tomorrow.

Salaries, Copiers, and Smelly Trash Cans

The day started off pretty good, and I guess it ended that way too. I met with Dave around 10:00 to discuss all the marketing opportunities that I have been asked about over the past week and a half. It didn't take long to discuss most of them because they were calls that I probably should have declined in the first place. Now that I know what media we do and don't use, I can begin to make some of those calls on my own and save some time and headaches. I did show Dave my layout and cover design for the sale flyer that we were contemplating and he really liked it. I spent a good deal of the morning simply printing out the retail signs that I have been making or revising in an effort to put together a master binder of all the signs available to the stores. I felt that it would be easier and more efficient/cost less to send the binder around to the stores with the operations managers and have them put together an order form for each store so I can print only the signs they need. I ran to Chick-fil-A for lunch today and redeemed my calendar coupon for a free chicken sandwich! Around 2:00 Mike (the tech guy) and I were given a thorough tutorial on all the features of our new copier. It does everything (short of making a pizza or cappuccino). It will even scan and image in and email it directly to my inbox! It also does lots of other cool things that I probably won't remember how to do when we need to use it. Tomorrow I will break it in and print 350 flyers for our sales rep in Knoxville.
I also received my paycheck stub that accidentally got sent to the Knoxville store last week. When I opened it I was very confused and after conferring with our HR manager I figured out that the incorrect pay rate had been applied for my new position! We worked together and got it straightened out.
Now for the Smelly Trash Can. I got back to the apartment today and was greeted at the door by a very foul odor that seemed to kick me in the face when I got close to the kitchen. I still don't know what caused that odor, but I promplty tied up the trash bag and took it out to the dumpster. I will be going to Walmart tomorrow and buying some air deodorizer to terminate any lingering odors and prevent future smelly take overs of the kitchen. Well I will leave you to marvel at the flyers I made that I have included in this blog. (it's okay that you had to re-read this section because you were no doubt drawn to look at the pictures of artistic genius again and again.) See you in 2 day!

The Copier is Coming, The Copier is Coming!

Can you guess what happened at work today? That's right! The new Color Copier arrived and this time was properly installed! (Does it worry anyone else that the high point of my day is the arrival of a new piece of office equipment?) I "tested" it out by printing some sample flyers and comparing it to the ones we had printed at a copy center. There was basically no difference. This thing is huge! (Really, it stands about 4 1/2 feet tall!) I will get to officially break it in tomorrow. I also got my own business cards today...I have arrived! I also ventured out today to Printing Impressions, where The School Box had flyers printed until we got this new copier, to pick up the last flyers we needed printed before the copier arrived. I found my way there and back without getting lost. This made me feel pretty good about my navigational skills.

I got home and fixed some Cheese Shells & Broccoli for dinner and caught part of an episode of Law & Order SVU. It was a repeat, but still pretty good. I decided to go ahead and file my tax return to see if I was going to get anything back. I got a pretty good return this year, just like last year! After that I talked with Mom on the phone for a while about various things and to confirm my reservations for my weekend stay at Le Chateau de Taylor. I got off the phone with her and then almost immediately my phone rang and it was Whitney! That's what I did until the start of the UT Men's Basketball game at 9:00. I will report on my meeting with Dave tomorrow and then I'll be 2 days away from returning to K-town.

Monday, Monday

Well,

It's hard to believe that I have been down here for 3 weeks now. Sometimes it feels like much less and sometimes it feels like more. I talked with Chris (the owner's wife) today and we are going to sit down later this week and go over the marketing calendar for 2008 and prepare for the next upcoming event: Back-to-School. This past weekend, Dave and the other Operations managers took a chance on advice from Kenny and I concerning Teacher Appreciation Day. For the past 3 years The School Box had held this event in May near the actual calendar day named Teacher Appreciation Day. The past few years have had dismal results, and Kenny and I asked if we could move the event to an earlier time in the year. We commented that we coordinated a promotion much like their Teacher Appreciation Day in January and it was a huge success. They took a chance on our advice... history repeated itself. We posted huge numbers in sales throughout the whole company. Knoxville had the highest sales of the day beating out the usual winner of Town Center (corporate store). That news was and exciting way to start off the week. Work was the usual mix of graphics, signs, and phone calls.

I watched the Lady Vols Basketball team finally beat Duke tonight. It was a hard fought game, but the end result was what I had wanted so the close calls and suspense till the end was worth the experience. I went to the weight room after I ate dinner and found it to be rather crowded. All the treadmills were occupied so I stuck to 30 minutes on the exercise bike for my workout. I created my own custom inserts for my Boy Meets World DVD set, and am now considering turning in early to gain some more sleep for another day. I will see you all this weekend when I come into town. Until then, have a great week!

Chatt-Town USA

I'll quickly re-cap Friday for you. I worked on some graphics stuff most of the day and spoke with a lady for WBXX (the CW) in Knoxville about their station promotions for education and how we might fit in to it. I ultimately told her to send me the station and programing guide through email and I would look it over and get back with her if we were interested. It was pretty quiet around the office Friday because all the buyers were in a meeting from 9-noon and then another meeting from 1-3. I left work and came home, fixed and ate dinner, and watched a new episode of Psych on USA. I went to bed around Midnight and quickly drifted off to sleep...

Now for Chattanooga. It was the first time I have ever met Whitney's Aunt Amy. She is one cool lady! We met at The School Box in Chattanooga (cause that's the only thing I know how to find) and then I followed her to Tony's where we ate lunch. I have heard a lot about Tony's over the years from Whitney, but this was my first time ever eating there. It was located in the Bluff Art District and was in an old house on the corner near the Hunter Art Museum. The food was great! Especially the homemade bread and oil to dip it in. I also found out that they make their own pasta too! After we ate we went to The Hunter Museum of Art. It was actually in 3 adjoining buildings that have been update somewhat over the years. It was really nice (and sorry to say this K-ville but it was far better than the Knoxville Museum of Art). We got to see some paintings from Andy Warhol, Grandma Moses, and many others. One of the sections was actually 2 floors of the 1900 Mansion that was donated by Mr. Hunter to house the original part of the museum. The 2nd addition was constructed in 1975, and the final additional, which housed the special exhibits, was constructed in 2005. The special exhibit was kind of cool, but very odd (as a lot of art is). We then went to the gift shop where Whitney stumbled upon small replicas of many famous chairs. We opened each box to make sure that what was larked as being in the box was correct. She got almost every one they had, and was vibrating with excitement the entire time! We then went into an art gallery near the museum and looked at what they had for sale. The result: lots of beautiful works of art and outrageous prices. After that it was time for me to head back to Kennesaw. I went home, fixed dinner, put together 2 floor lamps I had Whitney pick up for me a the Target in Knoxville, watched some TV and then went to bed. Good night all!