pixiecrinkle (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pixiecrinkle) wrote2004-04-18 01:44 pm
pixiecrinkle) wrote2004-04-18 01:44 pm
My body hates me right now
So last night was Art for Life, which is a benefit for the Columbus AIDS Task Force. I've volunteered for this event the last two times (it's every other year) and have loved every minute of it, even though I've worked my ass off. The last two years I've worked the live art auction as an art handler, and it's been a good group of people who come back time and time again, and it's gotten more and more organized. This year, they let a local art group handle the auction, so they tried to funnel me into the Silent Auction, but I predicted that would be boring, and took art wrapping instead.
Never, never again.
The Silent Auction turned out to have all the cool people I worked with last year. I did get to work with them towards the end of the night, but by that point, we were all so frazzled, it was only a small consolation. The earlier part of my evening was spent in a small hot room with 10 people with massive egos, one guy I worked very well with and 3 people who were willing to listen to the two of us. Oh, and our leader, who's inspiring introductory speech included the words "I don't care how you divide yourselves up." (Um, dude. Don't say that when we're about to go into overdrive for two hours. Bad idea.)
We had a 15 minute break between the 40 live auction pieces and the 220 silent auction pieces.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
automat76 and ryan_rita snuck me an illicit cocktail which I was very pleased with.
Then came the next small, hot, dark room. There were no lights in the room because it was a video installation gallery, so they'd thoughtfully provided *one* work light on a tripod in the far corner. Oh yeah, and one small box fan. It was hellish. We didn't stop wrapping for 2 and a half hours straight. For a while I was wrapping one piece to every two the two people next to me were. Then the silent auction buyers started picking stuff up, which threw a huge monkey wrench into the works. Thankfully, one other guy and I decided to line the pieces up in order, so we had some way of finding them (Last time around, this did not happen.)
It was chaos, but would have been fine, until one of the CATF directors (who I've never had a good experience with) came in and started trying to take over. She got snippy with me, and I got snippy right back when we ran out of bubble wrap. Then she had me "working the crowd" asking buyers for the numbers of their pieces. Never mind the fact that I was drenched in sweat and these people were wearing beaded silk dresses and we were already at capacity as far as looking for pieces. Finally, I went over to chat with a guy who used to work with me, who I never really liked. But I knew he was a semi-big wig at CCAD now, and I knew she'd lay off me, if she thought I might be important. Lo and behold, it worked. I felt slimy, but, well, I had already sweated out about 3 pounds of water, so I already felt slimy. :-)
I really think I'm going to write them a letter suggesting the following:
a. Give the wrappers light and a cooler room. And a bigger room. We move around a lot (the large piece system that one guy and I developed ended up looking like a choreographed aerobics session by the end of the night)
b. Have separate shifts of wrappers for the live and silent auctions. Five solid hours of lifting and running isn't easy on anyone in that kind of high-stress situation.
c. Bring back the volunteer orientation. Every other year, I've felt confident about answering random questions from people attending. This year, I didn't know they'd moved the live auction to another building until 5 minutes before it started. In fact, I didn't realize they weren't using the Art Museum at all until halfway through the event.
d. Try to instill some respect for the art in the volunteers. I can deal with people dismissing stuff as "weird" or "creepy" but it's hard to watch someone put their hand down in the middle of a canvas someone just paid $8000 for to brace themselves while using a tape gun.
Sigh. My wrists aren't happy with me, but they'll be ok by tomorrow. My neck and thighs and back though--well, let's just say I've gotten another reminder as to why I should never have quit my regular yoga practice. Ouchie. I'm glad I did it--this is still a really cool event, and I firmly believe in the cause behind it, but I really hope they get more organized by next time around.
Never, never again.
The Silent Auction turned out to have all the cool people I worked with last year. I did get to work with them towards the end of the night, but by that point, we were all so frazzled, it was only a small consolation. The earlier part of my evening was spent in a small hot room with 10 people with massive egos, one guy I worked very well with and 3 people who were willing to listen to the two of us. Oh, and our leader, who's inspiring introductory speech included the words "I don't care how you divide yourselves up." (Um, dude. Don't say that when we're about to go into overdrive for two hours. Bad idea.)
We had a 15 minute break between the 40 live auction pieces and the 220 silent auction pieces.
automat76 and ryan_rita snuck me an illicit cocktail which I was very pleased with.Then came the next small, hot, dark room. There were no lights in the room because it was a video installation gallery, so they'd thoughtfully provided *one* work light on a tripod in the far corner. Oh yeah, and one small box fan. It was hellish. We didn't stop wrapping for 2 and a half hours straight. For a while I was wrapping one piece to every two the two people next to me were. Then the silent auction buyers started picking stuff up, which threw a huge monkey wrench into the works. Thankfully, one other guy and I decided to line the pieces up in order, so we had some way of finding them (Last time around, this did not happen.)
It was chaos, but would have been fine, until one of the CATF directors (who I've never had a good experience with) came in and started trying to take over. She got snippy with me, and I got snippy right back when we ran out of bubble wrap. Then she had me "working the crowd" asking buyers for the numbers of their pieces. Never mind the fact that I was drenched in sweat and these people were wearing beaded silk dresses and we were already at capacity as far as looking for pieces. Finally, I went over to chat with a guy who used to work with me, who I never really liked. But I knew he was a semi-big wig at CCAD now, and I knew she'd lay off me, if she thought I might be important. Lo and behold, it worked. I felt slimy, but, well, I had already sweated out about 3 pounds of water, so I already felt slimy. :-)
I really think I'm going to write them a letter suggesting the following:
a. Give the wrappers light and a cooler room. And a bigger room. We move around a lot (the large piece system that one guy and I developed ended up looking like a choreographed aerobics session by the end of the night)
b. Have separate shifts of wrappers for the live and silent auctions. Five solid hours of lifting and running isn't easy on anyone in that kind of high-stress situation.
c. Bring back the volunteer orientation. Every other year, I've felt confident about answering random questions from people attending. This year, I didn't know they'd moved the live auction to another building until 5 minutes before it started. In fact, I didn't realize they weren't using the Art Museum at all until halfway through the event.
d. Try to instill some respect for the art in the volunteers. I can deal with people dismissing stuff as "weird" or "creepy" but it's hard to watch someone put their hand down in the middle of a canvas someone just paid $8000 for to brace themselves while using a tape gun.
Sigh. My wrists aren't happy with me, but they'll be ok by tomorrow. My neck and thighs and back though--well, let's just say I've gotten another reminder as to why I should never have quit my regular yoga practice. Ouchie. I'm glad I did it--this is still a really cool event, and I firmly believe in the cause behind it, but I really hope they get more organized by next time around.