Adventures of one who is totally floored.

Arrived at seven this morning and had a déjà vu experience. I said goodbye to the Housekeeper who said goodbye to me the night before when I left just after ten pm. That is when you know your at work way too much.

Had one of those days where I was run off my feet and just on the go the whole day. But when you ask me what I got up to I can’t really pin point what that is exactly. We had several functions on, one for 1200ppl, one for 400ppl and one for 170ppl. The funny thing is some days the event with 15 ppl total I was looking after the two seminars that were together yet separate and the lunch for 400 and my colleague DeNiro was looking after the 1200. I was on the go pretty much at 7 and did not get back to my desk for longer than 10 minutes till just after 12. The day starts with picking up the paperwork so you know what is supposed to be where. Then check to make sure there were no last minute changes on the supplementary paperwork. I then unlock the rooms and make sure all is in order. The seminar was for 150 and a return client. These usually go well as you develop that relationship over several functions. This client has a history of being fairly independent but niggly little things always seem to happen. This was the case when the room was set at maximum capacity and the client could not understand why we could not fit an extra 15 seats in the room. I explained that it was a little thing called Workplace and Safety and we need to guarantee safe evacuation for all guests. It comes to the point where we just can’t fit any more people in. But clients don’t understand when the Inn is full the little Lord Jesus has to go to the stable. Or in this case you just can’t add a sixth of your numbers half an hour before your event kicks off and expect us to be able to strip the whole room of the tables and chairs and then put smaller tables in.

Then the 1200 from upstairs were just going everywhere. When people get in large groups like that they just become like cockroaches and walk through ropes and staunchions and past signs that say "Private Function". The 1200 were in several rooms and also had displays on the hallway to our big fancy room. They also had their coffee and morning tea stations on the hallway. When my client for the lunch turn up she was shall we say was a little anxious at seeing 1200 people all over her hallway and was worried her 400 could get through. We sorted it with human signage and multiple signage and moving the lunch for the 1200 to other stations. So when the 1200 wanted their lunch and the 400 were walking the other way against the flow. We made it a lot easier by just shuffling the 1200 to the other side. Some days we play puppetry with people by just moving the food or herding them with ropes and staunchions. All tricks of the trade.

In the end the lunch was a massive success and they are looking forward to coming back later on for other events. That goes into the win column. We managed to squeeze the extra 15 in the back on chairs but no tables for them to lean on. That was a win as well. The afternoon continued to be busy but not as bad as the morning. So I left just after 4 and ready to be back for 7 in the morning.

Til Next time just follow the food,

Chops

Got a pleasant surprise I walked into the staff canteen and saw that our ever faithful canteen attendant Double was back in the house. She has been away since about November having carpal tunnel surgery. I have a very interesting relationship with Double. She is like a second mother to me. She is responsible for my sustenance and makes sure I am ok. We are at the point in our relationship where I don't order lunch anymore. She piles my plate with what she knows I like. I should mention that I do attempt to order but she dismisses me and tells me she will tell me what I will be eating. It is a little soup nazi but it is very loving. We do sometimes have disagreements over how much I should eat. I think one chop or schnitzel is enough where she thinks two or three is what I should be eating. So we play this game where she says “Chop?” and I say “yes thank you just one” She replies “No No three” then I say “Double I get too big one one” then she says “ Two three” then I say “one one” and then she puts two chops on my plate. So like all real parents they end up winning. She always makes sure I get my share of weggies too sorry her accent is thick I mean veggies. I never leave hungry and she often offers me seconds. But the funny thing is when others ask for seconds she tells them no very briskly. So Welcome back Double the House of Chops has been poorer without you. I even had to tell them what I wanted to eat!!! Disgraceful isn't it.

Last night was one of my regular clients. I specialise in one or two events. But work a variety of gigs. The boss likes to keep us with repeat clients. One of them is a certain sporting event. Of which I was once a major fan so that makes it a little easier for me to handle. The other type of event I generally get is the Church Based events. I think it is because I speak the language and know where they are coming from.

We have come to the end of what seems to be a season that has dragged on forever. It has run since early October so that is a fair chunk of time. I worked very closely with the organisers when I worked my other job at the House of Chops. That has continued and is a pretty open and honest working relationship. We have our adventures at times but generally it is a fairly fun time had by all and at the end of the day it we can generally laugh. I like to have all my set up jobs like placing towels in the dressing rooms, putting up signage and checking that all the rooms are set correctly. It usually leaves me with a little time to hang and check how things are going with the team. Everything went well and no major news to report. Went and had a chat with the cable tv crew. They have a bad habit of leaving leads everywhere and not taping them down. They have so far this season done a good job of ticking off our security and take up too much room on the loading dock. Which means I usually end up getting a peaceful workable arrangement from both sides. Same days that is a very hard thing to do as both sides can be quite stubborn. I have days where I feel like the mother of teenagers tending to their needs and ego's.

The security guards kept a eye on a few punters who getting a little too enthusiastic. Here is a tip: You can be passionate and vocal in your support but once you use foul language and get offensive with your comments and they suspect you have drunk a little too much. Your right on you way to getting some attention. But unfortunately it may be the wrong sort of attention and they may ask you to leave. So get into it but easy on the swears ok. After some very close competition. We Won!!! I guess that is a good thing. I was good and did not eat any hotdogs. But I did have a turkey and salad sub I grabbed on the way home. Because i had to be back and at work nine hours later to start all over again.

Til next time go easy on the swears alright,

Chops

Last night saw the monthly instalment of the Steak Club. We came to a grand total of 8 last night. There was myself and the lovely one, my colleague HE and his lovely wife Mrs HE, Another colleague but non floorie The Boy and his girlfriend PTM who herself also works at the House of Chops, the Rainbow Connection was also in attendance and the final was another floorie Hava. There was to be 9 of us but DeNiro another floorie mysteriously did not turn up. But he does have a tribe of kids and was playing Mr Mum yesterday so him not turning up may have came from that.

We joined at the Shield for P.D.D (pre dinner drinks) meeting in the same location every month. In the front bar which for some reason saying front bar makes me giggle like a little schoolgirl. One of the benefits of dining at the Shield on a Tuesday is that it is 2 for 1 night. I had my regular rib fillet medium well with mushroom sauce and baked potato and salad. I have the same thing every month so as to be able to give the most level playing field. One of the goals of the club is being able to compare the best pub steak in our fair city. So how did the shield rate? Not so good. It wasn't bad but it wasn't the best. The steak was overcooked and quite dry. The baked potato was small and nothing special. The salad was also not anything out of the norm. The sauce seemed commercial and not up to the standard I have come to expect. It was definitely not the worst meal I have ever had but I have had a lot better.

The conversation varied from the recent travels of R.C in the motherland. To various comments on the recent obscure news stories. We also discussed trashy television shows. For some reason it is quite magnetic to the floories. I firmly believe that it would be cool to have psychological profiles down of the floories. We have an interesting group very different but very much the same. One thing in our office all you have to do is sing a line from the musical and then the others will pick it up and keep singing. No major gossip or anything came out of steak club. Except the boys had the cast reading for a short film they are working on. The office has turned into a production office on quiet days with script meetings and story boarding. We all left around 9.20 and nearly walked out without paying. Every other month we have paid as we ordered but it was table service last night. A few of us were close to the door and freedom when I heard faintly “Chops” and then realised I was about to abscond without paying. But thankfully emergency diverted and all is safe in the world.

Till next time remember steak is your friend,

Chops

Had a Church board retreat on the weekend. What a adventure it was to be.

Left straight after Yoof on Friday got to the place. But we only had dodgy directions and turned up and it was just a small church not a house like we were told. Called the contacts to find it was three houses down. But they told us it was the way we came. It was actually the other way! We found it after half and hour and waliking through stranger’s property looking for the right house.

Discussed church business till 2.30 am! Then the boys hung out. I went for a walk on the island and managed not to be attacked by kurlews. They are local birds that can be vicious. I was the only one all weekend to come in contact with the beach. Went to bed at 3.30.

Woken at 8 and back into business. Good discussion about the future of our Church. We broke for lunch at 12. Went to the local one stop shop. The only shop on the island so the line was huge and slow. I got a home made meat pie. On my final bite i realised something was missing MEAT! That’s right went the whole pie and no meat but carrot, capsicum and peas. And it was like 4 bucks for the pie!! Not happy at all and then i had no evidence that it had no meat. I kept thinking there has to be some meat in here somewhere. I did answer the riddle that had plagued my brain since the night before when we got on the ferry. It was the name of the bartender on the original love boat. The answer is Isaac Washington. It randomly popped in my head. Very strange how my brain works sometimes.

We got roughly done by three thirty. I thought cool I can go home and spend some quality time with the lovely one. But then the rambling and going around in circles happened. Want to get me frustrated start arguing around in circles. Then to make things better bring in other topics that are not related. And we just made the ferry at 6.15. I pushed things along otherwise it was another half an hour. I would have cried if I saw the ferry pull out as we walked down the street.

Got back to my car to find a fifty dollar parking fine on the car!!! SO that was pleasant. The secretary suggested we have dinner and said you’ll be right Chops we will just go fast food and be out quick. The board wanted it somewhere nicer. So we went Chinese. It ended up being more expensive than we first thought and the food was really dodgy and all tasted the same. The Children’s worker was playing around and threw her chopstick across the table and hit me in the eye!!! I can see which is good. This capped off a very pleasant weekend.

I forgot to mentionthe mozzies and the heat that were very fierce. So as you can see the weekend was totally tops and so much fun. I got to catch up with the lovely one and just hugged her and told her to never let me go on a board retreat again.

Till next time, just say no to Church Board retreats,

Chops

I wish to start this entry with a bit of a tribute to the person among others who encouraged me to get a blog. Till I started the blog the only people that got to hear these stories was a small group of friends. How did that widen to the whole wide world I hear you ask. Four yrs ago I was in another city visiting a friend and the curate in the pre curate days was there hanging out. That is the curate from the curate's dregs wiblog. I then got to hang with the curate last year whilst he was up visiting my friend. It was at that time I told stories about what I do and he strongly encouraged me to get a blog and the wibsite was the best place to do it. So after um and awing I asked for a blog and here we are today. So much thanks to the Curate for his inspiration and it is a very large shame that his blog has come to it's conclusion.

Today I checked my stats and I have cracked 100 hits. So thank you all for your most wonderful support. I want to thank those hitting me in the top three countries United Kingdom, Australia and the ever-popular Country not detectable coming up at number three. I would also like to thank the not so common countries as well. They would be the Czech Republic, France, New Zealand, Canada and Thailand. They all have one visited once. I would like to get a hit from the United Arab Emirates because supposedly when you do in your statistics page the flag appears a whole lot larger than those of other countries. So if you know anyone from the U.A.E can you send my link along so I can see the large flag. Ta.

One thing I somehow forgot to mention about the Rainbow Connection was that R.C and I actually share the same first name. You could not believe how much confusion that causes for our colleagues and our clients. We often get radio calls like the following. “Housekeeping to Pete* (not our real names)” then the reply goes like this “ which one last caller” “Um Pete”. “Housekeeping we have two Peters on today which event is that for?”. It can cause much frustration and anger for us. The frustration can turn to Joy when we are working day shift and the other is night shift. It makes the handover where we introduce the next floorie to look after the client. We do standard jokes about it causes less confusion for our clients. That it is cheaper for our company as they just print the same business cards. And my favourite that our company has started cloning experiments and we are what came out of that. There is a big height difference and hair colour change and my sideburns are way superior to his.

My sideburns are my objects of pride. They are well looked after and are often referred to as “the boys”. And the reason I am called “Chops”. But they are slightly under threat as they are very large and nearly meet up together at the chin. I have had them this big before and it was cool. It was just before I left my previous job at the house of chops and became a floorie. My clients generally love them and remark about how good they are. The boss said I might need you to trim them back the other week. It was at this point I reminded him they were bigger a year ago when I had them and he encouraged them as they were well trimmed and showed individuality. I have not heard any more talk of trimming the boys. If they ask me I think I will start a petition. I am known around the building for them. Which is funny cause the Rainbow Connection is known around my country for his individual sense of style. He is known by one thing in particular people will call and say can i speak to xxx xxx Pete. It pays to be different in our game. Everything rises and falls on reputation.

Till next time stay unique and don't let the man shave your sideburns off,

Chops.

Well it has been a quiet week at the house of chops and I have only worked 10 whole hours. It is part of the dangers of working as a casual. Next week is a whole lot fuller than this week. But generally it works well for me as I am a volunteer Church yoof worker. I help look after all of the youth in my denomination for my state.

The only highlight from the house of Chops this week was the return from holidays of my colleague who in this forum will be known as “the Rainbow Connection”. R.C has been a floorie for many years now. He started in the building in the food and beverage department and then became a floorie. He has been with the company almost 10 yrs he is days away from his 10 yr anniversary. A big deal is made in our building when you turn 3 you get a pewter mug and saucer and at 5 you join the 5 yr club that has lunches and you get a caricature of yourself in a frame. Most people have them in their offices. So the floorie office is a mix of signed block mounted posters and caricatures. They recently had a raid of our office for the staff canteen and stole our prized Nana Mouskouri poster. That's scandalous isn't it. Nothing's sacred.

Anyway back to the return of R.C he was in the motherland for three weeks and saw many splendid sites. Highlights include the tower of London which is one of my personal fav places to go in London. He got up to all sorts of fun. R.C was telling me stories and then suddenly I jumped as I heard a shrill and loud “exterminate all humans”. I jumped and turned and there was a 30 cm high dalek coming at me using 7 various phrases and pointing it's blaster at me. Our R.C is a bit of a Doctor Who fan and bought himself a remote control Dalek. They are very much most cool. I managed to have a turn and not run it into anything. I was also very lucky to receive a Tower Bridge snow globe. It is another for my collection. My snow globe collection is a thing that others mock but it now sits proudly at 4 snow globes! People say that's not much of a collection. I explain that it is just the beginning and a collection has to start somewhere. It has joined the three glorious wonders of the modern world that already feature in my collection. I even have a Big Pineapple snow globe which is at the top as my most prized globe. So if anyone would like to send me some globes to enlarge my collection just drop me a comment and we can see what we can do.

We also took care of some very important business. We organised steak club. Every month the floories venture out to another location and sample the finest wares of that establishment. The official name of the club is the xxxxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxxxxxx Steak Appreciation Society. It is most fun to call somewhere and when they ask the booking name to blurt out the name real quick. Then they say did you just say the xxxxx xxxxx xxxx xxxx Steak Appreciation Society. And then to say yes, yes I did. The reply is always “oh”. Sounds like a fun club which we reply “yes it is”.
The steak club has several rules.

1. There is no steak club. Our boss is not invited and it is strictly invite only.
2. No talking about work unless it is the “sharing of information (gossip)”. As a aside I love how we Christians don't gossip but share information in love.
3. It must be at a pub.
4. It must have steak.

These rules are simple and mostly adhered to. Sometimes we need to enforce the 2nd rule. But normally a good time and conversation is had outside of the work context. We even invite a few floories emeritus normally. Our number floats around the 10-14 pax. Steak club originally started as a boy only thing. But before we had the first one I had the chance to go on a date with the lovely one before we were a couple and I had arranged to go out on the Saturday with her. But my boss begged me to work on the Saturday. Being desperate to create a chance to see her I changed the no girl rule and opened the flood gates. That was the night I summoned the courage to ask the lovely one out. By the way she obviously said yes. This was after a year of Chops majorly crushing on the Lovely one and never having the guts to say something. But the day of the first steak club I discovered the lovely one was 25 days from going overseas for 3 months. I needed to strike quickly. My colleagues and friends were grateful for me finally getting an answer as they were very sick of me pining after the lovely one and not knowing how she felt. I think they were happy that I finally knew either way how she felt. It has been a very long year of not knowing how she felt. They then put up with me as I continued to pine for 3 months while she was away.

As you can see from my being run over by a dalek, increasing my snow globe collection and organising steak club was pretty much all the interesting stuff I did at work this week. Which shows you how slow a building like ours feels after a extended busy period. We still had 20 events on this week. But they were all pretty tiny. But next week promises to be a whole lot busier.

Till next time,

Chops

Hello there again,

The big thing we had has now finished. But I still have a story or two from last week I did not tell you as I was away for the weekend visiting the lovely one’s family on their property in a rural area. But I am attempting to keep this blog pretty much just about my work adventures and will leave the romantic adventures of chops alone.

So the thing we had last week is so big it has spawned a charity fundraiser ball associated with it. The fundraiser aids a children’s charity and is not organised by the organisers of the big thing but a separate event management company. A small note of interesting background is that the thing is run by a former floorie and the ball is run by a another former employee that was run out of the company fairly quick ( I will not go into further details on that one for my own safety and possible legal action ). Suffice to say the two organisers have not always seen eye to eye so there was a wee bit of tension about. To make things more complex the ball was event managed by one of our event managers (E.M) who is not known for a eye for detail. This is how a event works in my building. Sales gets the event into the building and then events does the preplanning and prepares a event order which is the paperwork. If it is not on the paper work it is not done. This is where we come in because sometimes the expectations of the client and what is listed on the event order are very different things. This may because they have worked in other buildings and have different experiences. A classic one happened with the ball. The ball being a charity event had a auction. On all the paper work the E.M did not have deliveries expected. The deliveries were not on the daily freight received email because they were so badly labelled. So when on Friday at 5.30 for a 6.30 start the event manager asked me about where the two pallets of freight was. He knew that he had not told me and volunteered to get the freight himself. But being a desk jockey is worse than me with a pallet jack. So he needed to be rescued. He normally would not do that but we had a run in earlier in the week where he left something to the last minute and expected me in the busyness of the three events I was looking after drop everything and pin up the table allocations he had on his desk all day and had not told me till half an hour before the event was to start and I had another event also needy and about to start and the big thing as well. I told him it was to late and thrust the velcro dots and told him to put it up. You may be thinking why do I the guy in the suit need to move the freight are there not people for that. The simple answer is no. The client can book a porter to move that sort of stuff. But a porter must have a minimum three hour call. So often there is no porter booked as was the case of 8 pallets the other week. And because there is no one else to do it lands on our shoulders. This E.M is also famous for not booking porters when there may be 14 pallets of wine to move which has happened to me twice with his events. The other handy thing was the event organiser did not turn up till 6pm for a 6.30 start and when she did she needed ribbon and wrapping paper for gifts for her presenters. She also did not have the table allocations for the floor plans and told me that they were with the E.M who denied he even had them. This caused chops to go into hyper drive and attempt to sort out these instant hurdles.

I have forgotten to mention that we had 10 " idle rock stars" turning up at the big thing at around the same time. They were there to do a signing at one of the stands. We had the plans for that all week. They were to turn up in our special persons car park and rush into a lift (because it is not very rock for you to see them get out of a car and they should always look like they magically appear) and into the special waiting room and then straight onto the stand. The organiser of the big things safety guy had liased with the security team of the rock stars and told our security of the plan as well. But the problem was no one had told the supervisor on the night of the plan. And when they did arrive they turned up in a 22 seat bus which would not fit in the car park. This left me with two pretty large problems to fix. I left it to security to sort out as I was busy upstairs making sure that the ball was all good. I was hoping that it would be all good and not go pear shaped.

But like all good things I managed to pull some favours from some departments to help everything work out smoothly like move the freight for me. I also managed to source some wrapping stuff which is pretty hard to do after 5pm in a building like mine. But I went behind enemies lines and performed a covert op. And at the end of the day everything smelt of roses. And the pop stars were safe as there was no huge crowd as was expected and the 100 or so teeny boppers scored signed posters. It was a bit of overkill they had 4 in their personal security team. But I did once know of a teeny bopper pop star that did a personal appearance at an event and for a 5 ft pop starlet had 4 burly personal security guards and wanted our security to make a "presence". I may come across a but anti pop music but the truth is I am and refuse to buy my nieces and nephews pop music for gifts. My no pop music policy is legendary amongst my friends and something I encourage for all of you.

But in the end it all ended nicely and near disasters were averted and the world was a better and safer place. Well at the least the house of chops is a safer and better place.

Till next time,

Chops

Thank you for your kind comments. I was a bit overwhelmed at the response. I had 32 hits in the first 12 hours or so. That was a lot more than i thought. Well to be honest i had no idea how many hits to expect. To the person in Canada who read the blog Hi! To answer questions from the comments. You are correct i am not situated in Great Britain. There are a few clues in the blog as to the land of my origin. To answer the second question yes the lovely one does very much appreciate me walking in the heat and humidity. She has been vocal in her appreciation of making time to spend together.

I know i said i would update once a week or so. Well if things are happening i will keep updating but if things are quieter there won’t be as many updates.

After the housekeeping onto today’s tale of woe.

If you want to have a grand day in the house of Chops you need to do a couple of things or you may raise the ire of one Chops.Trust me you want a Happy Chops cause he is close friends with Angry Chops and he is just aroudn the corner and I can go get him for you if you like. (I realise that i come across very harsh in this blog but i really am warm and personable. I just don’t suffer fools well)

The first rule is read signs!! If you ask me directions and your standing beside a very clear six foot high sign with a large red arrow on it. I will reply with if you just follow the SIGN sir/maam and go blah blah blah you will find event xyz. The amazing thing about us humans is we are very much controlled by tone. I could be nice and sweet sounding but really i am ripping you apart and your none the wiser that i am really thinking is wow people are as dumb as sheep. It seems as soon as people get in crowds their I.Q plummets.

The second one is treat yourself and those around you with a little respect. It is amazing how people feel because you work for the venue they can get instantly venomous about the smallest thing. That is right I will go down to the carpark and save you a spot out of 1700 carpark spaces so you get one. The other one is the “Don't you know who I am?” tone. Which really gets me. People who think it is below them to find themselves in a line.

I had one such incident last night. We were running three ticket sellers at one of the booths. The crowd was in one line that then split into the three lines. The line would take about 10 minutes long to be served. It was flowing quite well. For some reason people struggle to go from the one line and split themselves amongst all three of the lines. There was a gap in one of the lines. A lady who was well dressed slipped under the ropes and in the line right beside me. I said unfortunately that is not the actual end of the line. She told me tersely that she was not moving and she was at the end of the line. I said I am sorry you will need to move to the end of the line. She gave me a look that would cool off a moose at mating time and said I am not going anywhere. I smiled that nice slick hospitality smile you some how acquire somewhere and said “Maam I am really going to ask you to move to the end of the line. It is unfair to those who were already in the line” She looked at me as to say if I stay you won't shut up will you. She told me she did not believe what I said to her was fair and walked to the end of the line. She stood there for two minutes and moved off to the next ticket booth. Ten minutes later I go check the other booth and she was just buying her ticket. She walked up to me and said, “I am very upset and hurt by your comments. I did not think behaviour like yours would be tolerated here. You should not speak to ladies in such a way” In my brain I said “From what I have seen of you your no lady.” I also wanted to say, as she was quite large across the shoulders and tall over 6ft. “Have you always been a woman you can tell me.” It was at this point she grabbed my suit and my nametag. I said “excuse me” if you would like my name I will give you my card. “Yes I would like that I intend to take this matter up with your management” And she once again stormed off. It is with blushing pride that I tell you no complaints were made today. My Manager is fully aware and several staff were beside me when she grabbed my badge and heard the whole thing.

Incidents like that confirm my belief that my building would be a better place to work if we didn't have clients.

Till next time love the one you're with,

Chops.

Ever have one of those days where you wanted to happily kill a co-worker. I have had two the last two days and it was the same co worker as well!! Well yesterday was Day One of me wanting to kill a coworker. We currently have a big show on and it takes up the whole building which is 500 metres long and 100 metres wide. Instead of calling myself the floored one I will use the following pseudonym Chops. I receive a call on the radio (walkie talkie) from the Security Supervisor (SS) saying we need you Chops urgently at Door 3. No worries I am down the other end in Hall 3 I will walk up to door 3 and meet you there. Can you hurry says SS it is real urgent and may get ugly. I kick the legs into gear and motor down the 300 metres to door 3. At this point it may help to describe myself physically. I am over 100 kilos and thinning on the head which is where I sweat heaps and I wear a suit and heavy boots as my uniform. Door 3 is a part of our large room which can fit several thousand for concerts or the seats move and becomes exhibition space. I get to door 3 and call SS and say “where are you SS, I am at door 3” “Chops I am at door 3 but I can't see you” “No SS I am at door 3 and I can't see you” “ Sorry Chops I mean Hall 3” That's right I then had to walk back to the other end where I had started in the first place!! Making for one very unhappy sweaty Chops. By the way the thing that was so urgent was someone trying to get entry into the show using the pass out stamp from the day before on his arm. The colour of the day was purple and he had a yellow stamp on his arm. Not a complicated issue and it was surely not urgent.

To make things worse for the last three weeks I have been working night shifts and working six days straight. I have not had much chance to spend time with my girlfriend the lovely one. In a attempt to spend quality time with the lovely one I have been having lunch with her some days. This involves me parking my car at work walking the 25 minutes to her office in the sweltering summer heat of my location and then walking back and going to work.

Yesterday was one such occasion it was approx 35 Celsius and steamy as a very steamy thing. I forgot we have a massive gig on at the moment and had to do laps to the other car park and thus giving me only 15 minutes to walk to the lovely one's office. I had turned on the turbo to get there in time. This combined with the “urgent call” and my normal walking around has caused me to be captain sore thighs. Which let me tell you gentle reader is not attractive or five star when you are walking around in a suit and looking impressive but have the gait of a very unhappy cowboy. Thank goodness it was just lactic acid and not chafing or as like to call it “ the curse of the large man”.

The reason I could happily throttle the SS tonight. During the rush tonight one of the stamps went missing. These are the stamps which change colour every day so we know who can come back in today and did not buy entry yesterday and attempt to get in twice for the price of one. The stamps have a major impact on the security of the show. The SS decided to call me on the radio and inform me of the loss so I could have a chat to the organisers of the show and settle them down. The SS used the radio which is all well and good normally but for large shows such as this the organisers use one of our radios on our channel. They had heard completely the whole debacle before I had a chance to say it in a more delicate way than we have breached the security of the event. That is why we have a mobile for discussions that need to be of a more discreet nature. Some of you may attempt to defend the SS and say he did not know that the orgs were on the channel. Normally yes I would agree but I had previously had a three way conversation an hour before with myself, the SS and the organiser. So if anyone knows how I could defend myself if charged for maiming a SS.

One thing is it can only get better tomorrow. I may regret those words later me thinks.

Till then,

Chops

Greetings Gentle reader and welcome to totally floored. I realise that many of you may be asking why is this blog called totally floored. Is the writer referring to the state of humanity. Well yes and no really i am but the main reason is that i the floored one works the floor in a major venue. Over the time of this i hope to regale you with many interesting stories of the adventures and shenanigans myself and my fellow floories get up. What does a floorie do i hear you ask. Well in my venue we are the hub. We are the go between. When ever the client desires anything the don’t need to find the various department to action their request that’s my job. Of course it is not as simple as that as we fill gaps when needed and also need to negotiate between the building and the client. For some reason 20 extra tables to be delivered in ten minutes is a reasonable request to the client. But to the crew who move the tables who may only have two guys on shift and are 500 metres away in the other end of the building it is not so reasonable.

We are the clients focal point for everything once they arrive. But at times clients forget and pass their requests through housekeepers or painters or anyone else they find and then the request comes to me and we encounter a chinese whispers sort of situation. It is one of those jobs where two days are never the same and you never know what to expect. I could be moving large pallets of freight across thick carpet whilst wearing a suit one moment and the next greeting Government ministers or other VIP’s.

I hope to update about once a week or so. If things are slow i will pull stories out of the back catalogue. I do hope that this blog is quite entertaining and will have the full range of human emotion to keep you the reader still wanting to read.

Till next time,

The Floored one.