WHAT A CROCK (OF CHILI)

I had the chili cook off today. There were a grand total of eight chili cookers including myself. I was excited, thinking I had a pretty good chili. Not to mention that people were commenting that mine was the best they tasted. Well, we didn't win. Now, I'm from Chicago where we buy votes. So I was giving away free fries with my chili, and where I even bought 300 extra tickets so that I could win the people's choice award! Well when all the tickets were sold, after selling about 28 quarts (liters for those of you on the metric) of chili, they said I only had 450 tickets in my jar from tasters. I don't really believe this. The first place person (a local bar) had 675. Anyways, I didn't feel really good about having lost after spending a great deal of time and money in the competition. But I won't be bitter about it.

Small towns are difficult to maneuver in. I just let go of a really good employee. But he had a short fuse and I couldn't have him flipping out in front of customers or other employees. So despite his really good heart, and despite his "bust his ass" mentality for the job, I had to ask him to leave today. He cried, and I felt so badly. He is expecting a kid, and we hung out a few times together. I just couldn't keep him the way things were going. So that, is one of the few things I just don't like to do when I am a business owner, letting go of people who you grow to care about.

I don't know what else is going to happen this fall/winter. I just printed another 250 menus for the November 1st break out. We changed some of the prices, and I deleted those things that just weren't working for us. I changed the hours. But now I am out of printer ink (again). My laser printer is really getting used well. I still have a couple thousand dollars in bills coming due between rent on the house, insurance on the business, the federal tax bill, the payroll, the mortgage. But I still have one week to go for some I have two weeks. This coming weekend is Halloween and we are staying open later at night on the weekends for the bar crowd. That is both scary and exciting. I hope we do really well. I can completely use the thousand dollar days on Fridays and Saturdays, and I hope that will be the case. It will make up for all the winter months coming up. I can also use some more delivery business. I have some people who drive in from the neighboring towns now because of my french fries. And one lady who has a lovely English accent told me that she can never call them fries, but rather CHIPS. I smiled, thinking of New Zealand again, and of course, the hope of building this business over the next few years and selling to move there.

I still think of JL. Fool that I am. And I hope the dance academy coming up this year will feel proud to have one very gifted addition to their new class.

I'm off to bed. I need sleep. Long day today, but then, all of them are longer now. I can't wait for spring and summer to come back. Love you all!