Another Road Show opened today, on the other side of the mountain.
…Twenty minutes before the doors opened, we were notified by our client that our display product (which had arrived yesterday) was all shot to shit. Dents, scrapes, chipped paint, missing trim…and worst of all…no sales literature to be found.
…Now, I had just paid a Contractor this morning (over $500) to ship, set up, and prep this same said product, with zero update notations on his work order. According to him: the job was done. And so as calls from Client Corporate and OUR Corporate started streaming in on a tsunami-wave, we were just a little-bit-lot confused.
Me: I just paid that dude half-a-grand for one day of work. Are you flippin’ KIDDING ME?!
Boss: No.
Me: What exactly DID he do for four hours, if it wasn’t prep, clean and set-up?
Boss: Pick his nose and get drunk? How the hell should I know?
Me: And we don’t even have sales lit out there?
Boss: We gotta find someone to go over the mountain. Now. Who we got?
(WHS Pimp and I list off names. We make the calls. No one will do it.)
Boss: Well, fuck. I suppose now I have to do it.
(WHS Pimp and I blink at one another. It is quiet a moment.)
WHS Pimp: But. Um. There are repairs that are needed too. Not just brochures and order forms.
Boss: Well, I guess I’ll have to do that too.
(WHS Pimp and I blink at one another. Again.)
WHS Pimp: Oooookaaaaay…
Me: What he means is – How?
Boss: I can “fix” things. I’m not completely useless, you know…
(WHS pimp and I try not to look at one another.)
Boss: …I’ll just need some supplies. Paint and rollers and…I dunno…hammer? “Stuff.”
WHS Pimp: I’ll…I’ll go get you some. “Stuff.”
(WHS Pimp leaves. It is just Boss n’ I alone now.)
Me: You know, there will be people there. Customers, I mean. Watching.
Boss: Yep.
Me: Watching you. “Fixing” things.
Boss: Uh huh.
Me: …And as far as they know — you’re one of our Contractors…
Boss: Yeah.
Me: …Who actually, like, shows up to build their stuff. That they are buying. From us. On that floor.
Boss: Right.
Me: …So…um…have you like ever actually built or painted anything. At all. Ever. In your whole life?
Boss: I’ll figure it out.
Me: …Okay.
Boss: And listen — I need you to help put the fire out. Fax this to their sales department so they have “something” out there, and tell them I’m on my way.
(He exits. I take a second to contemplate the ruin that will surely come upon us. I go to his office to use the fax. I face a box with brochures in it as WHS Pimp re-enters.)
Me: He forgot the lit.
WHS Pimp: He almost drove off without the paint.
Me: Will you flag him down and give him these, please?
WHS Pimp: Yup.
(As he sails out the door…)
Me: We are fucking doomed.
WHS Pimp: So, that must mean its “Friday” then…
***
And now Boss has just called.
…He’s about to go over the pass and be lost to all communication for at least the next hour.
It is only 12:30.
The WHS Pimp has three site-visit fires to put out, and Corporate is screaming about some completion forms we’re holding paychecks ransom for, from the Contractors.
…But: I have me a dark-roast from the nearly-naked-ladies Barista stand down the road (very popular with the fellas here, so I always let them go get it for me)…and the sun just came out.
That means I’ve got at least two hours before Boss will be able to bother me again.
…With some new earth-shattering problem.
…Like, how to use a paintbrush or something.
~D
