Post-con recovery....

[dalesql]

Boskone is done and everything is out of the hotel. I still have a bunch of con suite boxes to go through at the nesfa clubhouse to remove all the food items from them so they will not attract bugs or critters in storage for the next 51 weeks. Most of my personal gear is back home and unloaded, and I have a load of dirty wash cloths to run through the laundry and bring back to NESFA.

It was a very long and exhausting weekend for me. This year my minion-fu failed me. I was unable to recruit people ahead of time to work the con suite. Thus I was waking up at way too early in the morning to get into the hotel each day to start the coffee, and staying way late to take care of things until close to midnight. I may reconsider my decision to boycott sleeping in this hotel. I will try to recruit more folks to work on the con suite, but historically, I am not very good at that.

Beverage consumption was noticeably lower this year. LEss soda pop consumed, but more coffee and tea, I think. Partly I'll attribute this to the storm thursday and saturday impacting our attendance, and the hotel air not being as dry as previous years.

I got home yesterday in the early afternoon, and had to unload my van so I could carry the broken snowblower to the repair shop. Once those tasks were done, I sat in the easy chair and caught up with my parents, and listened to the electrolux salesman delivering a new (EXPENSIVE!) vacuum cleaner to my parents. Then I retired to my bed where I slept for about 15 hours. Now the alarm clock is going off and I have to go back to the day jobbe.

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[dalesql.livejournal.com]

I guess I'll write my thoughts and observations here for my con suite report. Warning, this will be kind of stream of consciousness, so don't expect organization here. I'll organize it better for my official notes.

Con suite moved in the galleria room again. Finally I am next to the sink and the service elevator. Also ended up with effectively more square footage since there were few other functions encroaching into nominal con suite space this year. Both of these factors made a lot of details a lot less effort. No more lugging buckets of slop water and trash through the art show to be disposed of, and bringing jugs of fresh water back for making the coffee. Easier to wash up dishes as needed, not letting them build up. Need to add a dedicated table for dish drying. More physical space for back of house stuff meant that it was easier to get at things when I needed them. I need to organize things in advance better.

Unfortunately, the truck unloading prioritization for stuff I needed thursday for SBOF failed, but was able to get hot water and coffee made barely in time by scrambling around to find what I needed. The box with the small amount of coffee and decaf for sbof was nearly last off the truck, but the box with the main coffee supply came early. Assuming I want coffee for next year at SBOF, I'll put the minimal coffee setup supplies into one of the big white coolers with the coffee pots, which did come off the trucks first as scheduled.

I need to recruit more staff folks as shift leads. Also try scheduling things better and putting the schedule on paper and post it in the con suite. Maybe organize the big black coolers for cold stuff one each for friday, saturday, sunday, friday night reception, and overflow. I ended up only using two of the big white coolers, maybe one of them could be modified as a soda fountain setup?

Vicki and the food coop folks produced their usual avalanche of wonderful breads. Less than usual since the snowstorms cut into their activities. There was an unexpected plethora of salads on saturday afternoon, and loads of valentine candies that I was not expecting, so I did not use much of the chocolate and sweets I bought. But they can go to the clubhouse just fine as meeting snacks.

Three cases of corn chips, and about 15 bags of assorted chips and popcorn. Ran out of hard boiled eggs sunday around noon, which is about right. I underbought diet dr pepper, and diet gingerale, overbought pepsi. Didn't use the salsa since Vicki brought loads of fresh salsa friday evening.

[dalesql.livejournal.com]

Couple of experiments this year. The TV for watching the Olympics. While there were usually someone watching it, often it was not being watched at all, and never a big crowd. SO I think that it is not worth repeating. The power strip and cell phone chargers on one of the tables. There was often someone there using the power strip or charger. One of the chargers got stolen friday evening, so will have to secure it better next year. The cost is low and I think doing it again is well worth it. May buy a second power strip and a couple more chargers and do it with two tables.

The third experiment was the seltzer spigot. Once equipment cost is amortized, it makes large supplies of seltzer available for pennies per gallon, and once I figured out how to assemble it correctly, it is a huge savings of logistics hassle. I didn't have to buy and transport and put out about ten cases of selzer water. I think this is a win and needs to be done better next year, possibly installing a cold plate and spigot into a cooler. Consider doing soda pop on tap for our main flavors. (Coke, pepsi, and diets, Maybe dr pepper and diet, maybe ginger ale. ) Then only have to do bottles of the lower flow soda pops. The ready availability of seltzer, U-Bet chocolate syrup and milk allowed many egg creams to be made. Went through nearly the entire gallon of chocolate syrup, and 14 gallons of milk. Could also do the apple and cranberry juice via soda gun.

Fourth experiment was the conveyer toaster we borrowed from Arisia. It was running all the time con suite was open, except the morning I forgot to turn it on until a bit later. Much bread was toasted. One time some bread did catch fire in it, but turning it off and blowing it out allowed the carbonized bread to be poked out. Several other times I did smell burning bread, but when I got there, there was nothing there, or I saw that a crumb was finishing being carbonized. Need to purchase a long (24 inch or so) wooden spoon or dowel to use for poking at stuck bread to knock it loose. Some idiots did put bread with butter or cream cheese on it through, and that did melt and burn onto the metal of it, making stains we were unable to completely clean off. I did put the toaster on a bare wooden hotel table, after determining the hotel tablecloths were not 100% cotton. Used some of my cotton bar cloths as improvised tablecloths under the front of the toaster to keep food from touching the hotel tabletops. Need better signage for the toaster, explaining how to use it and why the intensity is turned down to light.

Many compliments about tea selection, and amusement at the smooth move chocolate tea someone donated. Coffee never ran out (although early each morning some dealers were annoyed that the only coffee available was the warm coffee left over from the previous night) The vanilla syrup and the vanilla extract and the whipped cream ran out saturday, need to buy more next year. Cold beverage world was two big white coolers, taking up two tables, plus one double stack table as a stock shelf. Hot beverage world took up three tables, plus the back table for the brewing coffee pots.

I had more tables for my serving side, and finally had enough room. There were six tables for food serving. Three for breads and bread spreads, three tables for all the other foods. I didn't put as much cookies and chips out on the round tables, mostly due to lack of staff, so consumption was down on them. The funny spices for the eggs were popular, and also got used on the salads. Grape jelly remains unpopular, but strawberry is the big hit, mixed berry and marmalade did well also. I wish the jelly assortments had less grape in them.

Having the cash to directly tip the hotel employees every time they came through I think made our service much better. Directly tipping them remains controversial in NESFA, and no doubt will cause much contention in next year's budgeting process.

More later, if I think of it. I haven't totaled up my purchases yet, so don't know if I hit my budget or not.