Last Day as an Employee

Strange feeling... I've been thinking about what I'll have to do so much that I didn't give any consideration to what this would be like. I spent most of the day packing and had a great lunch with a group of friends. I wrote a short message to the folks that are still left and included a link to this blog. Interesting to see that so many people were curious enough to click. Tomorrow I'll go in for a bit and go through the "Exit Interview" process. That will officially be my last day as an employee.

Overview Meetings with Contractor, Press Release and Business Cards

Over the last couple of days I've driven out to the mall to meet with Don, our contractor, to review the renovations we're going to be doing in the space. I'm confident that Don has a good grasp of all of the changes we want to do. The more I go out there, the easier it is for me to envision the space as it will eventually be. I drove out there today and found that our "Coming Soon" sign had been posted already. The sign is very plain, but at least it gets the message accross.

On the PR front, I've received and made revisions to Jenifyr's first draft release. It is sort of strange reading about yourself even if it isn't in print yet. I'm confident that Jenifyr will do a great job getting it in ink. I'm starting to feel pretty good about it and I think we'll probably issue the release in the next week or so.

I also ordered my first batch of business cards. This may not seem very important, but I only have two weeks left working at Motorola and I want to be able to hand out as many as I can before leaving. These cards can be redeemed at the store for a free "quick fix" bag of chips. I'm hoping they will bring some people out there and that those people will order a dip and soda to go with the chips. By the way, if you're looking for a great printer for your business cards, I've place several orders with Printing For Less and found their service to be great. Check them out and use my referral code (RP1QSDHJ6) to receive a $25 on your first order.

Back Home After Hurricane Frances

I brought the familly back home today after being at my folks house for five nights waiting out hurricane Frances and its aftermath. It's nice to be home again!

I actually drove up to Boynton to check up on our house with my dad on Monday. Our place did fairly well. We lost some roof shingles, had some damage to our wooden fence, and have slightly thinner trees now, but that's about it. We also ended up losing everithing in our fridge and freezer. My dad and I threw all that out when we were here. Seems we lost power on Friday, Sept. 3, at night (lucky that we left that morning). We found out we had power from one of our neighbors this morning so we packed everything back up again and headed home. I love staying with my parents and everything, but it's just not the same as being in your own house. I think they're going to miss having the kids there a lot!

Preparing for this damn hurricane was a royal pain in the butt! Since our house was built just prior to hurricane Andrew in 1992 (and we've slacked on getting them on our own), we don't have hurricane shutters. I started our preparations by running out to home depot to get plywood to board up the windows. This was the Wednesday before the storm at 10:30 in the moring. I was in line about 2 hours before I got the maximum 15 sheets that they would give me. I also bought a bunch of 2x4x12's that I used to build a wall across my lanai. Unfortunately, the 15 sheets was 2 sheets short of what I needed. I wasn't going to wait in line again, especially since I really didn't notice that I needed more until Thursday evening. By then the lines were much longer and the weather was starting to turn crappy. I started looking around until it struck me... "Hey... the chip cooker is in a crate... a wooden crate!" It was like I ordered the thing exactly to fit our front office window. I built a frame out of the studs and drilled one of the large faces of the crate and one small scrap piece directly into the space. The best thing is that "The Chippery" and "Fragile - Handle With Care" were clearly visible for all of the neighbors to see. See for yourself in the picture:

Plans Approved by Division of Hotel and Restaurants

I got a call today from Lynne, the plan reviewer from the division of hotel and restaurants, saying that our plans had been approved. She was very pleasant on the phone. She said that she was so bored waiting for the hurricane to pass that she ended up taking plans home to review and she got through ours. I'll be sending her a case of chips as soon as we're up and running!

I also called Steven, the permit expediter I had talked to earlier, to see if he can pick up the plans and take them over to the Palm Beach County offices for the Fire Department's approval, but I couldn't get a hold of him. If don't talk to him before I get back up to our house I'll just rund down there and take them in myself. That will save me about $400.

Preparing for Hurricane Frances

Things aren't looking too good over here. It seems that hurricane Frances will pass by close enough for us to see at least some of the effects of the storm. Other than the regular preparations for the family and home, now I have to worry about the business. Even though the store hasn't been started yet, I still have the Chippery cooker sitting in my garage. This was supposed to be a temporary holding place until we received access to the space in the mall so I didn't think that updating our insurance would be an issue. Our contents including the cooker add up to more than what we're insured for (gasp!). The plan is to push the mall to turn the space over as soon as possible and get the cooker over there. The mall sits further inland and may not experience as strong a storm as we would. We're fairly close to the coast. I'll try to keep this updated with what we do.