The Little Job That Grew

I don't know if I can say I didn't see this coming.  I wasn't looking.  I have no excuse.

Probably, if I had taken even one moment to think about it, that little sensible voice in the back of my head would have said something like "Do you know what you're getting yourself into?"

But that's all moot.  I did not stop to think about it.  The little voice didn't have a opportunity to ask her question.  I am armpit deep into a job that I anticipated being only ankle high.  And I'm not done yet.

The "little" job I volunteered for was updating the home town information for the South Saskatchewan Vacation Guide, an annual publication that strives to educate and inform travellers of all that our corner of the province has to offer.  I had already had one kick at  the can last year when the publishers had asked our local tourism board for fresh event dates for 2017.  When I reviewed the advertisement that was going into print I promised that we would absolutely be freshening up the information for the 2018 edition.  That was this time last year.  Naturally I didn't given it another moment of thought until autumn.  They don't call me the procrastination Queen for nothing.

So, at the last meeting of the season I told the rest of the board that I would happily do the write up.  After all, I am comfortable in the role of writer and they were quite willing to let me run with it.  That was eight weeks ago, and I'm farther behind now than when I first got started.

Around the same time as I began to gather information and photos for this vacation guide project I received an e-mail about information and photos needed to revamp our online presence.  I'm one of the newest members of this board - I don't know if it was my greenhorn status that kept me from realising that this was now actually two projects:  one for a printed magazine and one for a province wide tourism web page.  I agreed to this second job thinking it was the first job.  That was the bad news.  The good news was that both projects were looking for the same info.  The print project wanted more written info, the electronic media could handle lots more pictures.

Which constituted phase two of my project: try to track down high quality photos that illustrate the things I wanted to write about.  I wrote letter to other community groups formally requesting both info and photos to help me out.  No one got back to me.  I asked people who take a lot of pictures to see what they had.  There are good shots in bad light and great vistas taken at the wrong time of year to show off a campground.  And who can believe that we serve Saskatoon pie and ice cream for four months straight and have never bothered to take a picture of a pretty table setting of this treat?

About this time, in my quest for clearer instructions from Sask Tourism my call was forwarded on to a guy named Bob.  My new friend Bob.  Bob, who assumed I had called him about his new pet project - a day trip guide within our area to augment the more general information in the vacation guide.  I had not called him about this, yet another project that would turn out to be job #3.  He sent me an e-mail describing it in detail ... the info he is looking for is mostly the same as jobs #1 and #2, only a little more detailed.  Oh, what the heck!  Since I'm in this up to my waist anyway, what's one more?

It's early December.  My deadline is the end of this week even though the publishing deadline is a month farther down the road.  I have an assortment of pictures and some copy written.  Today I decided I'm far enough along to send what I have out to other board members for feedback, which may well complicate my life further.  On the one hand it's good to have more ideas and insight for a more well-rounded effort; on the other hand more ideas and insight will take more time.  I'm just crossing my fingers that if there is tweaking necessary, it won't be much.

Meanwhile my desk is cluttered with copious notes about what I need to do, piles of paper scribbled with the information going into each project, and lists of photos that need to be sent.  The whole thing has woven itself into such a tangle in my mind I'm going to have to call good old Bob one more time just to see which e-mail addresses belong to which job.

If I dig deep enough I'm bound to find my "List of Things to do Before Christmas".  That's next week's project.