Wednesday, June 22, 2005

I did it all in a night.

We just redesigned the Big River web site. I never really liked the one that we had up there, but as they say "the cobblers children have no shoes..." I don't get paid to work on my own stuff, so I just bit the bullet and did it.
If you are a cat lover, don't go to the site... If you are a dog lover, you might buy a web site just because it looks sooooooooo good. www.bigriversystems.com

Help me check it for typos. I'm sure there are some problems with it somewhere. We have an ad that will be on the WTVA traveller in about 6 hours, I don't know if i'll be awake to watch it or not. But I wanted to have a better looking site when we did the capitol campaign, and this was as good of a time as any.

No those aren't my dogs. But they are good looking dogs. I need to get some good ones of my girls and put on the BRS site. They'd be offended.

The Cannons Still Rumble

I was reading about the "killing / killin" trial today and found this story about some cannons that still are used just outside of Jackson to stop hail from damaging cars. I'm sure they will figure out another reason to stop capitalism from working.

So what did you think about the Killin trial? I like the way court TV had to call it the "KKK Trial..." What an interesting spin. The Klan wasn't on trial, but some 80 year old man. Don't think I'm trying to be sympathetic to him, I'm not. But I'm sick of the liberal media taunting this as something other than it is. It is something that should have happened a while back. But I get sick when I see Jesse Jackson get on TV and ranting and raving that society has created a industry of incarcerating black men. Saying that we (the white conservatives) have started a multi-billion dollar industry keeping blacks in jail. So let me get this straight. I get them to rob, and pillage, and shoot people and rape people so that I can make 9 bucks a day per head off of them in prison??? You have got to be kidding. Good call Jesse, you nailed it... (What an idiot!) Jesse, the village called, they need their idiot back!
How that has anything to do with the "Killen Trial" I have no idea... But Jesse had to link it somehow.

I'm not a Klan sympathizer, I don't believe in that type of thing. I get mad when a new (black owned) business is starting on main street and the old men down town start saying there is a "negra woman" opening up a .......
I get mad when elders in some churches don't think there is any thing wrong with the Klan, and they testify to such on national TV. (That's right, you saw a Presbyterian elder on national TV saying stuff to that effect.)

I know that this is a long post but the last thing I want to ramble about is the fact that this case, and others like it has been touted as a possible stepping stone for "reparations." I don't know what to think about that. If I took someone's money, and stole it. I should give it back with interest. If my great-great-grandfather owned slaves should I somehow be liable for that?(by the way he DIDN'T) How do you decide who is? Every white person? Southerners? I don't claim to know much about all of this, but I do know that I sure don't think that money is the answer to these problems.

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

So no one commeted on the $125 hair cut...

I'm very dissapointed. I happen to know for a fact that some of you read about this... and thought..."My wife will never do that!" and didn't even back me up... Pathetic. Really poor guys... Really poor.

I've had a crick in my neck that has bothered me since the moment I woke up on friday. It was so bad then, that I couldn't turn my head... I wish I could report that it's better... but its not.

Thursday, June 16, 2005

Is it already Friday?

I can't belive that we are 1 hour away from being friday... This week has flown by. I can't remember another week going as fast as this one seemed to go. RYM didn't seem to go by this fast and that was REALLY fun. I don't know what makes it go by so fast, but I'm sure that being really busy has something to do with it. Business has been wild, cash flow has been more like cash po' this week. I think it has to do with taking a week off a month ago -- the things that take a month to pay, aren't paying right now. Anyhow, it's all coming back to me now. I'm working my cans off trying to get things going with the sales of some of our products. We've been working on a way to refine our message. I heard a brilliant man, Leland Speed talk today about "Knowing what you are selling." Or "Knowing what Business you are in."

I thought about that for a long time... Selling a new car isn't really about selling transportation (that could be a bike or scooter). It's more about selling the experience and the status of driving that brand new (terrible investment) that smells so nice and that is SOOOOO comfortable, and -- so much better than last years model that would have saved you 10 grand. So what do we sell I asked my self... We sell web sites. But we are in the "customer service" business.
I'm not scared to tell people that our hosting starts, rock bottom at $240 for a year. But I'm always quick to tell them that we also give them the owners cell phone number. Try getting the owners cell phone number for 4.95 a month. You can't even get a phone number for that. It doesn't matter if you are 50 times more expensive if you can be counted on to get done what the client needs, when they need it. C gives me a hard time when I carry my cell phone around all the time. I try to gently remind her that the cell phone has paid the bills for the past couple years when it rings. (It's also been a pretty big pain in the @$$ sometimes)

So back to what business am I in. I'd have to say we are in a couple of them. But the MAIN one. Is the customer service business. We take care of our customers. Even if it means taking a loss sometimes on a site. We have to take care of them first and foremost.

Speaking of customers.... I had the great priveldage of being at "Tokros" in starkville when my wife was getting her hair du did. (yes i called it a "hair du") We walked to the counter after it was all over and she said oh so sweetly -- "That will be $125." I almost had a heart attack. I couldn't belive it cost that much. That's a fourth of our mortgage payment to get some hair colored and cut. I must be in the wrong profession. C swore she had no idea it was that much. I swore that she needed to check the freaking prices before ordering. Dang.
Dang.... It still stings... I mean this isn't NYC. It's starkville. Give me a break.

Ok well, I'm about talked out for the night. I'm worn out for shore.... Basketball was fun, I'm not near as sore as I was at first, I guess I need to step up my game some.... If I could just afford new shoes... oh well, her hair looks really good, I'll wear the old shoes some more.

Sunday, June 12, 2005

Finding the right man.......

For the pulpit.... We had a "consultant" for lack of a better word come to church the other night and give us a pep talk about finding a new pastor. He gave us some stuff to give us guidelines on how a pulpit committee is supposed to run. One interesting thing was that he said that we shouldn't have people from each group or faction of the church, but that we should have people who are good at the tasks needed to find a new pastor.

We took a survey to help identify the traits and characteristics of our church. It was something that I've never seen happen before. We are going about this in a "scientific" way. We haven't even got a pulpit committee made up yet, but maybe this will happen soon. I can't wait to see where we go. It's like you get to pick a mate or something -- getting to pick your new pastor.

We don't know when the PC will get created, or if I'll even be on it, but I'm really excited about this.
I'll have to post more later. C is watching TV and it's really distracting.

Thursday, June 09, 2005

I can't believe that it's already thursday

Wow things have been happening fast. I get so sick of people talking about how busy they are. I know my faithful (HA) readers all are just as busy as I am, so don't think that I'm trying to say that I'm more busy, I just am really running wide open right now.

Things are exciting... They really are, H. my sales guy has been on the ground for a week, nothing closed yet, but it ususally takes two meetings to get to the right person (they call that the decision maker). We are going to see someone tomorrow who might have a BIG website that they need and also are very interested in bridal buddy.
I'm interested in paying all the bills this month :) as I am every month. It's really exciting to see things going, our new girl K. has been great. She's 30, working here in town, has been a cellular rep too. She didn't know much about what we were doing a week ago, but now has bought into the BRS plan. She's working hard and she's been great to work with. I'm lucky to have them both working here.
We just finished up a site www.thegrovejams.com that is really cool. I didn't know we could do stuff like that. We did, it looks great. I'm amazed at our little team. We have the over-excited guy with the vision and the excitment (and hopefully some management skills). The designer who is creative, but doesn't have more than a high school education. Another one of those, who's broken english happens to be better than my broken spanish. The new girl who is sharp... really sharp. The sales guy who used to be with a big time cell phone company... but was sick of it. And we really are like the Adam's Family -- odd but every one has a job and they are doing well at it.

God has really blessed us. I can't wait to see what we can do with it. Bridal Buddy might be the best thing since sliced bread for us. We have a marketing avenue that is cost effective that is getting 11 million wedding related visits (not hits) per month. It does cost some to get on it, but if we can get 500 of those to buy bridal buddy each month, at 50 bucks a pop... thats 25G's a month. I'm gonna bet we can sell at least 100 a month. We need something to hit.

Thursday, June 02, 2005

so here I sit..... because I can't stand

I played basketball Tuesday night for almost 2 hours. Played 4 games of 5 on 5.
I'm soo sore, I played again tonight... I couldn't hit ANYTHING... I think it might be because my arms and legs feel like jello. I have muscles that I didn't even know I had that are crying out in pain. But I'm on my way to losing 20 lbs this summer.

New girl in the office is working great. She's a quick learner... motivated...teachable. What more can you want?

My new sales guy has spent the day training working on getting some presentations ready and I think he's about to take off on this thing. He's had some good ideas... I think the "staff" are starting to get what might be about to happen. We had a "staff meeting" if you can call it that. I have two people older than me working for me. One girl who doesn't have a college education... another that is great at flash design... and me... What a staff.
We talked about the future of the company... and about what our goals are for it. I think that they all buy in to "the dream"..... and see at least some of the potential from the products that we are launching. I can't wait to see this happen...

Ok I have to go take a hot bath and let my legs relax..... I'm gonna die.