Hello all and thanks for all the positive feedback. I'm very glad you are enjoying my blog. Here's the first Saturday blog. Saturday is our change-over day. This means that people leave by 9:30 a.m. and the next group arrives around 3:00 p.m. In between those times we have to have the cabins emptied, cleaned and readied for the new group. This entails a lot of work. So I will try to describe what its like on a typical Saturday here at our resort.
At 7:22 a.m. we were woken up by someone pounding on our residence door, which is in the lodge. He wanted to pay for launching his boat. Our private boat launch is the only good boat ramp on the lake and we charge $10. He then asked if anyone was catching fish, etc. Here I stood in my red, fleece robe with black/white pandas on it, my hair all messed up and no shoes on, and he wants to ask what the fishing has been like... Couldn't he tell by the make-up under my eyes and my robe that I just got up? My look must have made an impression because he then apologized for waking me. So I took his money, told him what the latest fishing report was and then he left.
By 8:30 I was finished with my breakfast and had a good start on my caffeine intake. It was sunny and hot already so it was going to be a scorcher. I need a lot of caffeine on any given Saturday. After a few telephone calls later, I realized I would need a lot more. One of our cleaning girls wouldn't be coming because she hurt her ankle, another was going to the hospital, one had to work until midnight the night before so wouldn't be in, and two others I couldn't get ahold of on the phone. Out of 6 girls, I was down to only 2.
Usually I don't have to clean the cabins on Saturdays. I mostly strip the cabins of the old/dirty linens, turn off the refrigerators/freezers so they thaw for good cleaning, take out garbage, etc. This helps the cleaning crew a lot. John usually bails the boats, mows, empties the grills, makes repairs and garbage runs. But today I had to clean so it was a great thing that I had made 5 bags of clean linens, etc. for cabins the night before. So I had a jump start but I knew we were going to be running after the 3:00 p.m. (check-in) time before we would be finished cleaning.
Cleaning cabins entails wiping down all surfaces with a bleach solution, washing dishes and silverware, wiping out the refrigerator, coffee maker, microwave and stove with extreme solutions to disinfect and anti-bacterial all and every thing. Beds have to be remade, everything has to be dusted, windows have to be cleaned, wood floors swept and washed, well you get the drift. At the end we vacuum everything with a commercial (wonderful) vacuum, throw on new rugs and out we go to the next one.
John went ahead of us today and washed out some refrigerators so if the customers arrived early, they could at least put their groceries in a cold, clean refrigerator. My nephew, Tommy, helped by bailing out the boats, emptying the charcoal grills, mowing the 9 lawns and even stripping some of the cabins of dirty sheets. He was a Godsend. If it weren't for him, the lawns would be long, we would still be bailing boats, well you get the drift.
Thanks to Sophia and Monica, the only ladies who could clean with me today, we didn't have any problems and got done with the last cabin at 4:30 or so. Not bad. People were very patient and understanding when they found out that we only had 2 cleaning ladies here. The last 2 cabins were for people who had been here before and they especially didn't mind. They were just very happy to be back up north. Their put their food in their clean refrigerator and then headed down to the beach.
When we were finished, I paid the girls, thanked them a lot and as soon as I could, I jumped in the shower and John and Tommy jumped into the lake. I relaxed on the recliner to make sure my feet wouldn't fall off and that my back would relax back into line. Awhile later, I drove Tommy back home to Minocqua to my brother's. It felt really strange to be leaving the resort on a Saturday, no matter what time of the day, because we never do that.
I also made a stop at a department store to buy a new digital camera. Ours broke so that's why I haven't posted any pictures yet. Give me a little time and I'll have some on this blog. I got sand in my old camera and the lens wouldn't open any more. For awhile I could hear the sand grinding when the lens would open. I guess it finally gave up. Now I can put new pictures of caught fish on our Facebook page for our resort too. Customers will love that. I also picked up more window cleaner, dish soap, full size sheets, etc. When we go to a big city, we have to stock up on the necessary things. Since the nearest department store is 25 miles away, it is not convenient for us to just run to the store for electronics, sheets, etc. We hate to order stuff on line because then you pay for shipping and sometimes you don't get what you thought you ordered... So we make the most of those "city" trips.
So after I got back, there were people and kids in the lodge talking, yelling and laughing. The dogs were happy to see me, as usual, and I gave them a treat. Then I visited with our customers and had a few laughs.
I can hear the rain outside so that means no campfire tonight. Oh well, there's always tomorrow, day 5, Sunday.
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