The universe is upside down...

The last two weeks has been a roller coaster ride of immense proportions... the universe (please don't panic, it's only my universe) is upside down. As you know from previous blogs, the summer is the slow season for security guards because of the weather mostly and work is usually hard to find. But in the last two weeks, I have worked 10 out of the 14 days! Not to blow my own horn, (although I am very good at that) but I am feeling the love from my two security companies and they are obviously enamored with yours truly because they keep ringing my phone... But it's with mixed feelings about this "love" being showered down because I haven't worked this much in a long time but the gigs were very varied and quite interesting... (of course I will share them with you).

Like I said, the summer is USUALLY slow and nothing starts to happen until football and students return to ASU at the end of August... I got the call from Company #1 to work freshman events at Wells Fargo Arena on campus Tuesday and Wednesday, the 17th and 18th... (I know...it seems I'm always working from behind. Good thing I'm not a reporter, you'd just be finding out there was an oil leak in the Gulf today!). Basically, the week before classes begin, students return and move into dorms and apartments and the college has activities planned to welcome the new students and introduce them to college life... and Tuesday was concert night and Wednesday was speech day. The concert was opened by "Chingy" the rapper, and even though I consider myself a fan of all musical genres, I was quite glad that I was issued a set of earplugs... The fans seemed to like it though... I was posted next to the stage and kept people from getting backstage. the main act was Dierks Bentley, the country star and Arizona native... (and so much more my cup of musical tea). The show rocked, the students cooperated and there were a couple of dancers who should have been on television... Aside from slight hearing loss for awhile, it was a great gig.

The following day was a meet and greet with ASU officials and students, band and cheerleaders... learning the fight song, appealing for students to support the sports teams, introducing students to the main officials, etc. I ran security for the event and was running around posting guards and answering questions (congratulations on your promotion) but it went smoothly and the people at ASU were happy so it al went well...it was over at 5pm and I took off for volleyball and played into the night...Oh, yeah while working the concert one of the bosses came up to me and asked me if I would work a wedding in Chandler on Friday night...the woman who runs the venue was getting herself and requested that I work her wedding... (it wasn't until later that I found out that she didn't remember my name when requesting my services...she asked for the "big, bald, scary guy" that had worked there before). Oh well, I don't care how I get the jobs as long as I get them. That was a 6pm to midnight job that went very smoothly and was followed by a six hour gig on Saturday at ASU to prepare for opening day football on September 4... (I will be supervising the home team tunnel during the games this year---pretty sweet gig). We got finished around 3pm and I came home and changed and went back to Chandler to work a "quinceanera" which is the Mexican equivalent of Sweet Sixteen (except the girl is fifteen years old). There was a large group and we were there to make sure the youngsters didn't partake of ant adult beverages... (back in the day I would have gotten around that, but that's another story for another time) The party went well and I got home around 1 in the morning... While at ASU I got another gig...this was an overnight (12 hours) shift at the Cardinals training facility in Tempe on Monday night. So Sunday was truly a day of rest because then Company #2 and asked me to work Tuesday night and Wednesday of the next week...