and now for my next act...

There is a certain discrepency in the job description for the Income Development Manager position at the American Cancer Society. Right next to minimum experience required and related skills, they somehow forgot to post that in order to obtain employment, one must be a magician.

Yes, a magician. But this time, instead of pulling rabbits out of your hat, you are pulling $100k events out of your..umm..pocket. Yea, pocket.

Let me tell you were this reasoning has come from. Basically, I have an event coming up this weekend (this is the reason I postponed my move by 1 week; I could have left ACS and had someone else run it but my nobility swept over. ugh.) And this event, which has typically raised an average of 15k for the past 6 years is supposed to magically raise 35k this year. Along with raising this sum of money, I am also in charge of getting a dj, stage, sound system, lighting, bathrooms, generators, etc. all for free.

Why free? Well, when you ask me what my budget is, the answer is essentially zero. Money spent on the event is money that is taken out of the fundraising income. Since the fundraising income is not hitting, nor exceeding, its goal, the money spent on the event must not exceed zero. You get the math? Good. This is when I have to think back to my days at Houdini Elementary and Copperfield College, when we would snap our fingers and magic would happen right before our eyes and girls would pop out of a coffin without a single scar.

As typically happens every "1 week" before an event, I woke up Monday morning with a minor panic attack. Im not kidding, at 5am began the nightmares and cold sweats thinking about how I would pull this off. To add wind to my fire, I still had to get a Special Event Permit from the Permit Nazi's at the City of Miami Beach. Ofcourse any normal person would have taken care of this a month in advance but not I. For some God unknown reason, it is genetically encoded into my DNA that I MUST, and I mean MUST, wait 1 WEEK before an event to get any highly important logistics of an event squared away.

My mom says that I'm a masochist and I love to be stressed and worried. And you know what? I kinda believe it to a certain point. I dont work well, or at all for that matter, unless its under pressure. And I mean extreme pressure. So off I went, I knew what had to be done, I knew it WOULD be done, I just didnt know how. And then came the phone calls..

"Hi Nicole, its Judy from the City of Miami Beach, I went ahead and filed a special event permit for this saturdays event, I just need you to getme the insurance certificate and come sign and notarize"

Okay, so that was eerily easy. I just have to make a simple request to Sandy Salas for a $1,000,000 insurance certificate that usually takes 10 business days to receieve. She already hates me and wonders how I even have a job so how bad can this be?

"Hi Nicole, I had that event on file, please confirm that all the information is correct, this is the last time you make a rushed request"

That call was followed with an abrupt hang up but hey, i think im on a roll here....

"Guess what nic, the MB Convention Center is donating the stage and North Beach is donating the Sound system, and DJ Jumbo said he would emcee pro-bono. Plus, there are already bathrooms on the facility and the lighting wont be necessary since the event ends rather early"

Am I dreaming? Nope, God loves me. I dont say that in a pushy-psycho-evangelist kinda way, I say that whole heartedly from the bottom of my sinning heart. I pray, He listens, He Calms, He. gets. it. done.