Woe, woe and thrice woe - Part the Fifth – Lobsters and mussels and tee-offs, oh my!

When we left our intrepid blogger in Part the Fourth, it was approaching supper time on a Friday and she was hurtling westward at 112 kph, approximately 600 kms into a 672 km trip, sipping the world's oldest coffee, with a dying cell phone, no car charger, a distressing wobble coming from the wheels and having decided to press on despite the car's exhaust system being disturbingly grumbly.

I don’t have an immediate need for gas, but fill up anyway to save myself the trouble on the return run. I not only fill up the tank, but buy still more coffee (mmmm… coffee) which I then proceed to spill getting into the car, because I didn’t need a lid on the cup. Oh no. Not me. Status quo. Back into the gas station to buy a package of paper towel. *sigh* Wipe it up and onward I go…

The last bit of the drive takes me through one of the most beautiful areas of the island with lovely rounded mountains that were sheered off during the last ice age. They look like Lego or Playmobile settings. I loves me some mountains!

I arrive at the resort and find “my” chalet. Co-workers are all already there, having flown in earlier. And they’ve got the hot tub fired up. Just the thing after a long drive.

I then spend the entire weekend doing battle with venue staff to ensure meeting needs are met. I feel like I am in a bad dream wherein every new character is created new with no prior knowledge or contact with the other characters. I feel like Smokey the Bear, putting out a forest fire with an eye dropper. I feel like a deck chair organizer on the Titanic. I feel desperate…

Despite having worked out a detailed game plan with their event coordinator prior to the event, with a separate page for detailing the requirements for meals, meetings and every errant sneeze, details regarding what we need are scarce on the ground. It all appears to have been for naught as few other venue staff have any idea what I've prearranged and when they do have an idea, it's inaccurate. The staff are all lovely but they don't know what it is we need done or when. The coordinator forbad my contacting other resort staff members individually, assuring me that she would pass along all the pertinent information to the others and claiming it would be “too disorganized” otherwise.

Did she pass on the information? Did she heck as like.

A few examples, as to list it all would take an entire weekend...

The golf pro (who is in every way a lovely individual, he was just mis- or un-informed) has prepared lists of foursomes and has our tee-offs starting 40 minutes prior to the requested time, which would make them DURING the meeting. This despite my having made ir clear, in writing, that the golf tournament is on a load-and-go basis (foursomes are made up as people arrive, rather than dictating who plays with whom). I had, in fact, typed at the top of the list of golfers, DO NOT USE TO MAKE UP ADVANCE FOURSOMES – LOAD-AND-GO BASIS ONLY.

I’m curious as to how the golf pro got the list of names but did not get the notation at the top telling him not to waste his time doing up foursomes. It shall forever remain a mystery. A mystery wrapped in a damp golf towel and stuffed into the bottom of a golf bag.

And the food. It was wonderful. Truly wonderful. There was one just the one small problem. Some of it would have been lethal to some of our attendees. The event coordinator had assured me that the chef was au courant with all possible allergies, sensitivities, dietary restrictions, etc., that we could possibly throw at him.

Let me just say that there were mussels and shrimp featured in a buffet for which I had advised we had someone attending with an AIR-BORNE LIFE-THREATENING SHELLFISH ALLERGY and could we please have NO SHELL FISH on the menu. And when advised that one of our staff members could not eat the pasta as she is allergic to wheat, he blithely advised that he would be more than happy to prepare a SPECIAL PLATE for her – of Durham wheat pasta. Right… fruit cup it is, then.

But, all good things, as the saying goes, must come to an end, and apparently, so must all bad, as finally, mercifully, Saturday night arrived and it was all over but the crying. And with no one murthered, which was a miracle. In fact, the whole thing was seen as a success, which is just as well as I’m out of commas.

Next up - Woe, woe and thrice woe - Part the Sixth – Yes we have no resonator

Almost done, only two more lovely parts to go.


P.S. This saga starts here. You'll have to scroll down for Part the First, as Blogger doesn't provide more specific links.