So...What's Next?!?

Outlining the Next Few Months

So much to juggle, however they are things that keep me motivated.

First the house...the house is a perfect example of "be careful what you ask for." We wanted a house that was pretty much a blank slate that we could work on to make our own. Boy was it...complete with white walls. I hate white walls. That was the first thing we accomplished when we moved in was putting color on the walls. But the carpet does not match. We have picked out the new carpet and bamboo floors. Yesterday my husband ordered a new front door. I have been tearing wallpaper down in my bathroom - I do not understand why people want wallpaper in their house, but...

All of this should be done in the next couple of months. Personally I am excited to get our dining room area set up. We are not going to use it as a dining room, but more of a library. It is attached to the kitchen which we have set up like a coffee shop and the dining room will be like our little Barnes & Noble.

Next my personal goal of getting and staying in shape. I delayed meeting with my trainer, but he has not given up on me. I have my first meeting with him tomorrow night. The goal is to get my endurance up, work on getting my strength back and then I will join their HIT class. I am looking forward to the end result. Start with the end in mind, right....

As far as the Bennigan's sitcom, I figured out how to make it come to life. It is perfect for sketch comedy! My husband and I are fans of Sketchworks here in Atlanta and they have sketch comedy writing classes and acting classes. My husband has agreed to taking the acting classes with me, so stay tuned.

Also related to creative writing - I am working on another performance piece that was inspired by the STIR event. This one is on the sensitive side, but I think is important. When it is complete and ready to be read I will let you know. I have also decided to start attending more spoken word events.

Vacation...boy do I need one, or two. We have planned our beach trip finally. In a couple of weeks I will be spending 4 days at St George Island with friends and family. I also started planning the trip to NYC with my son for his 14th b-day. It is a bit more expensive than I anticipated...but I will keep researching.

Personal finances. I am excited to announce that we are in the best shape we have ever been with our personal finances! wahoo! That includes the business cash flow as well. That is only more motivation to keep building. Believe me, this has been a long learning curve for me.

Associations - I just resigned from my post as programs chair for AECF. I love that group enough to know it is time for me to step down because I could no longer give them what they deserve.

Currently my focus is on the Enterprise 2.0 society. We have a huge event coming up in September where we hope to partner with other associations. We are reserving space for over 200 people at GA Tech. From there we  have a number of initiatives for the first part of next year which are very exciting.

It is also time to start gearing up for SoCon09. Also, if you read this blog regularly you know that I am part of the Social Media Club's Interim Board and we are hoping to re-launch a new chapter here in Atlanta.

That is enough to keep me busy as far as associations go - but expect to see me networking a bit more.

In regards to the business I am focused on enhancing the online training. I also am putting a plan together to "drink my own koolaide" and start marketing the company through more social media channels.

If you have read this far you will get to know that I am also looking at a very exciting strategic alliance. In the next couple of weeks I will be aligning my business with a company that completes my offerings. I will be working from their office space at Studio Plex in Inman Park. We have a video production and podcasting studio, which is cool, but more importantly is the technology for market intelligence gathering and for distribution that has been developed. It's very exciting. I hope to start scheduling meetings to demo their offerings and my services as soon as this week. I am also working on ideas for us to go to market together.

All of this is gearing me up to go national. I am currently working with 3 clients on long term projects and have 2-3 in the pipeline. Now that I have an office space to work from I am looking to bring on a junior account manager - which I have already identified a couple of good candidates.

So yeah - I am busy - but having lots of fun.

Update on the Bennigan's Sitcom

I found a "How to Write Screenplays" book in the basement. It was something I bought for my oldest son when he was into acting. So, I think I will take a stab at writing this out as a screenplay or something as opposed to a short story. I have some connections in the performing arts here in Atlanta, maybe we can turn this into something one way or another.

Anyway, my husband and I decided on what the first story should be. At one time most of the kitchen staff and a few people in the front of the restaurant were on a work release program from the state prison that was down the street. They were all very nice and respectful, but they were not in a state prison because of their immaculate self control.

If you have never worked in a restaurant you would not realize the sensitive relationship between the kitchen staff and the servers. You see, sometimes servers screw up, by putting in the wrong order, or forgetting to put in the order, and then they make demands of the kitchen staff to help them fix their mistake. This can throw a cook off his groove.

Now, sometimes the kitchen messes up and loses a ticket, cooks the food wrong or whatever. When this happens, servers get quite upset because not only do they get thrown off when they have to side step to fix the problem, but it actually affects their income, perhaps for the rest of their shift depending on the domino affect of the situation.

So, cooks and servers can get a bit tense with each other at times.

Now, anyone who has met my husband would know that he is one of the nicest, most gentle spirit, patient men in the world. But occasionally an irrational temper slips out. He is not the biggest guy in the world, 5'11, medium frame.

One night he walked down the line in the kitchen screaming F*** You to every single cook. They simply walked around to where he was, picked him up and proceeded to carry him to the deep fryer. They were serious.

What happens next? Well you will have to wait until I get it written out. Perhaps it will be complete by this time next week.

All thoughts and comments are welcomed.

Perspective

A few days ago I described some of the "characters" I had the pleasure to know during my time at Bennigan's. Writing a honest sitcom about working in a restaurant has been something my husband and I have discussed doing several times throughout our years together. I realize the best way to get something started is to start.

So now that I listed a few of the characters, I am trying to decided the perspective of the story. Of course the stories and even most of the character development will be fiction (well some has to be true, the truth was so wonderful).

The perspective could come from the retired gentleman who got to know everyone and hear all kinds of stories. We could capture the reason why he came to that restaurant every night. Or it could be from the GM who hid in his office. It could also be multiple perspective, which is something that the show Friends did well.

I am leaning more toward hearing the story from the retired gentleman. I need to give him a name - his real name currently is all I can think of. He was sort of a mystery on many levels and I really like that about him. He also would stay at the restaurant for at least 3 hours a night which gives us enough time in each episode to build a story.

Now the next question...I have always seen this as a sitcom, but scripts are boring to read. So to draft it out I think I need to write each episode as a short story, and then if we are ever ready to shoot some pilots we could turn the short stories into scripts. Yeah...I think that is best.

Alright my husband and I will probably have some quality time this weekend, we might be able to come up with a good opening story.

More to come.

Characters

Some of the most interesting Characters I have ever met in my life were from when I worked at Bennigan's across from the Miami airport in 1990 - 1994. My husband (who I also met there) and I often talk about writing a sitcom. There really has never been a good sitcom that portrays the true humor of working in a restaurant.

I want to use real names, because their names were often so defining of their characters. I just do not know if I should....

Here is a list of some of the people I have in mind for the sitcom (excluding names for now)

A man who was a retired airline steward who came in every day at around 5:30 with his mom. His mom was so beautiful and elegant that every new server mistakenly assumed she was his wife. He would drink 2 gin martini's, dry 3 olives, then he would have white wine with his meal. They sat at the same table every night for at least 3 years, until alzheimer's began to take her away. The gentleman continued to come in alone, and sit at the same table. For awhile whichever server was stationed in that section would wait on him, and then he requested to only have my husband wait on him, and then that station became my husband's permanent station, which was a good thing.

Then there was the captain. He was a creepy old man with an annoying wife. One night, without knowing that the woman with the retired airline steward was his mom, assuming she was his wife, the captain suggested a night of swinging.  It was not taken well.

There was Manny - and I have to use his name because that is who he was. He was a little, 5 foot spanish guy who was known for saying "gimme a hug." The man could screw everything up every night and talk his way out of being fired. He was already high strung, but we suspected he was also using coke.

There was the tall black comedian, whose name I actually do not remember. He should have been a stand up comedian though, which in a way he was. He would stay in his station all night entertaining his guests while the rest of us served their food and cleaned their tables. We sometimes were annoyed by that, but it was around that time I learned the importance of "make em laugh" and you can get away with almost anything.

There were the pranksters at the bar who would tell new servers that their job for the night was to pick limes from the tree outside or to get a bucket of steam.

There was the revenge that was plotted on guests who complained, did not tip well, or over-stayed their welcome, such as the staged spill of a tray for of drinks all over a woman, or the um....well...never mind, some of these stories will have to wait.

There was the crazy boss who stayed locked up in his office. He was the GM too.

There was the boss who attempted to trap me in the walk in cooler one night, I pushed my way through. I later took the incident very innocently, but a few years later someone wasn't so nonchalant and he was accused of sexual harassment.

There was my all time favorite boss in the world. A blond petite greek woman no taller than 5 feet who would stand up to the cooks in the kitchen and make them leave their weapons outside of the restaurant.

These were some of the more formative years in my life and there are some great stories I hope to be able to start exploring and compiling into something that is entertaining as well as heartwarming.