8.10.07

Caught the 7am flight from Minneapolis to LaGuardia for the start of the August New York International Gift and Accessory Show – an absurdly long title for a show, but a good show none the less.  Up at 5am which is in my opinion quite early, and I hope to never be at a point in life when it is not.  

Simple thing, things that I have mentioned before, getting the upgrade to First Class, making fun of the coach class people as they walk by.  Conversely, when I don’t get he upgrade, I always look with utter disdain at the first class people as bourgeois as I make my way back with the rest of my fellow proletariats to coach.

Well for now I am in the bourgeois class.  Of course if you were in any even marginally decent restaurant, you wouldn’t even let the food they serve you on these domestic flights touch your table, but for some reason at 35,000 feet in the air, it’s suddenly manna from heaven.  The flight is a short one, and I think we are in our decent right now.  

Upon arrival, it’s a shorter ride to Pier 94 where I show – shorter than coming in to JFK, which is why I pick LaGuardia.  I have two freight shipments arriving at the show – one from High Point that is all the stands, power cords and lighting, and then three pallets from home that is all product.  The shipment from High Point is being driven up by a guy that does some work for me during show times – Jimmy – and hopefully he has already set up all the things he is bringing which will be great, not to mention save me quite a bit of time and energy.  

We can rewind a little bit.  Things back home have been chaotic in a good way.  As you may have read, we are moving our store to a great new location at the end of August – so there are all of the preparations for a major move and setting up a new place, we are running a huge moving sale which has gone quite well, at the same time we have this New York show.  So as I said, chaotic, but I like it, and as far as I know, none of the wheels have come off yet.

Well it’s now two days later -two days of set up - and I am all ready for the show, which starts tomorrow.  The I was amazed at how well the set up went, to the point where I finished at 2pm today – usually I am setting up until 8pm.  I even sat there for an extra 45 minutes staring at things wondering how I have an extra 6 hours to kill.   Next plan of action: nap time.  Walk back to the hotel: from the piers where we show on the Hudson, through the stables area, through a little LAtino area on 10th, through Hells Kitchen, on through Times Square/Disney Land, across Broadway on to the hotel and up to the room for a nice hour and a half nap.  Get up, get a coffee and walk around town for a few hours.  Meet up with my friends Vince and Vincent from Miami for dinner at a great little Italian place and back to the hotel for some ironing, computer work, Discovery Channel (no Comedy Channel for some reason, so no Daily Show) and off to bed for a good nights rest before the first day of the show.

I know what you’re thinking – the glamorously fascinating life of an international merchant:  exploring foreign lands, wading through vast bazaars, dealing with remote village cultures . . . or more realistically:  packing and shipping freight, unpacking boxes, setting up booths, and of course, nap time.