Sunday, my usual day of "rest". Or I try to rest, I should say. Crows or ravens woke me and customers up around 7 a.m. They were calling loudly from a tree outside the lodge's window. After awhile I fell back asleep but then didn't get up in time to go to church like I usually do. So no trip into town means no Sunday Journal for John either.
By 9:30 a.m. John had a request to guide a woodland hike. So he started out. I looked out the window and there were several kids all waiting for him to guide them on a hike through the woods. John said something and they all laughed as they followed him up the road. All kids who come here love John. He never had any kids of his own, but with all the kids who come to our resort, he has a very large extended family.
Customers needed a lot of little things today: info on jet skiing places (not here), towels, toilet plunging, to rent a boat, info on kayak outings tomorrow, and a new anchor. We rented out our boat but when they put the anchor down, the rope broke so we lost an anchor. I found them a new rope which wasn't even used yet, found them a used anchor and off they went again. Tomorrow John will try to snorkel to find the anchor, which was a large, nice one.
The mosquitoes are very bad because of all the rain we got the last 30 or so days. So everyone who steps outside has to spray deet on and everywhere you meet someone, you can smell their bug repellent.
I did some laundry, which has accumulated in the basement from yesterday. There's a huge pile of things to clean and put away. I got a good start on it today. I did two loads of just throw rugs and one of just rags. We cut up a lot of old towels and use them for cleaning rags on Saturdays. If I don't clean them right away, they really start to smell. I hung up the throw rugs on the basement clothes lines because throwing them in the dryer would ruin their rubber backing.
For a Sunday the telephone was ringing off the hook this morning. We didn't get any new bookings yet though.
John saw an osprey being chased by an eagle over the resort today. He said usually a person would think the osprey was a pretty large bird, but next to an eagle, it looks much smaller.
I served a lot of kiddy cocktails (not kitty as previously put), ice cream cones, root beer floats and sodas today. Its always fun to have a lot of kids on the lodge. They played foosball and tried to talk my ear off several times during the day.
One of the customers brought in their lap top and showed us their vacation pictures from Dominican Republic. That was really nice to see. We are always happy to see pictures of our customers/friends at somewhere else besides here. That helps us to get to know them better and have other conversation topics with them too.
That's another thing about running a resort that's very important - getting to know your customer. It was very difficult for me to not want to talk about myself all the time. I felt that the person I was talking to should know me a little in every conversation. Wrong! In this business, the person who is staying at our resort is the most important. I need to ask them all questions about themselves and their lives, how the last year has been, how their business and kids are, etc. I had to re-wire my brain to do this. Sometimes still, after 9 years, I catch myself talking a lot about me. Maybe it'll be a life long project for me, but other people would probably be fine with this right from the start. Regardless I am finding out that I am becoming a much better listener, am getting to know people much better and I feel much better in the long run about myself. Hopefully the customer will leave feeling better about talking with me too.
Owning a bar and resort means you cannot tell others about each other either. Its almost like being a psychiatrist, lawyer, best friend and sister all in one. Whatever you tell me stays with me because you are like family when you stay here.
Becoming a good friend with customers can also backfire on us though. We had some customers cancel last minute and it cost us $2100.00. Since we consider them a friend, we didn't pressure them to send in the full deposit we usually do. So when they cancelled their 3 cabins (family & their friends), we were out a lot of money. One of their friends called us to tell us they were very sorry when they cancelled too, and we could hear it in their voices, but that sure doesn't help our bottom line.
Whatever we make in the summer has to last us throughout the year. So taking such a huge hit means we have to eliminate something along the line. Do we stop providing a lot of things like paper products in the cabins so customers have to buy their own? Or do we stop providing something else for ourselves? I cannot imagine what that would be. John has been thinking along the same lines and so he made an appointment with a financial advisor this Wednesday. We need to know if we can refinance, if we don't have to worry, or if we should sell a cabin or 2 or what. Sometimes selfish people don't realize how they effect others, which is very sad. We are sure we will be fine, and don't worry about us, but we want to be proactive too. If we just sat on our hands and did nothing but watch the boulder roll down the hill at us, how stupid would that be? It'll hit a bump and go the other way, I'm sure.
John swam around the island again today. He has been doing that for exercise and therapy on his sore shoulders. He said since he has been swimming his shoulders have not been hurting as much and that the exercise feels great. I'm glad. Walking is more difficult for him than others because he has braces on his ankles and walks with canes/sticks. He fell when he was 21 and broke his back. When I say fell, I mean 150 feet and he's lucky to be alive. So swimming is great for him as exercise.
Tomorrow morning we will be taking a group kayaking up stream to a beaver dam, which is always pretty. Then tomorrow night is the weekly, Monday night, pot luck, which might not happen. We have a large group here this week and sometimes they don't do the pot luck. We'll find out tomorrow. I hope we still do pot luck. I love pot luck. Its a great way for everyone to meet who's here for the week and be social with each other. Sometimes customers just stay to themselves the entire week and not meet who's here so the pot luck was started as an ice breaker. I love to cook so this is always great fun for me to try new recipes too. If something I pick to cook isn't that great, at least I won't be eating it for a week. At pot luck almost everything goes that night. Fun!
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