Categories: General
      Date: Apr  9, 2009
     Title: For the love of Computers!
After the long winter we are all anxiously awaiting the first day of rafting season to begin. We have the long checklist that we check twice to ensure we are prepared for our first customers of the year. Most of our base camp staff returns to work a week in advance to get the grounds clean, tents out for the platforms, stock the shelves of campstore, get the bathrooms ready, get the Outfitters’ store stocked and ready for customers, prepare the Red Dog for the weekend crowds, etc. We have our delivery trucks coming in daily to bring us our supplies for food service, Pepsi delivering the soft drinks and most importantly the beer trucks delivering the beer for the Red Dog. So Thursday we all look at the checklist and say: Camp store ready? Check! Outfitters’ ready? Check! Campground ready? Check! Red Dog ready? Check! River Staff ready? DOUBLE CHECK!!!

So last Friday morning we are anxiously awaiting for our first trip to depart. Everything went well with no glitches and then…the server for our reservation system goes down and the backups have been destroyed! Are you kidding me? Something we couldn’t prepare for, something totally unexpected and there is nothing we can do to solve the problem in an efficient, timely matter. Hours go by and still the system is down! We leave that day with intentions of everything having to be re-entered for the year. Once again…are you kidding me? Ummm…drink at the Red Dog anyone? Fortunately, the band Felon was playing in the Red Dog that evening, and one of the members just happens to be this awesome computer technician. He was able to recover the data and put a glimmer of hope in our eyes that only a few days worth of data are missing. Even though (in a way) I hate computers because we’ve come to rely on them so much for everything, and you feel so helpless when something like this happens. Of course, it seems to happen at the most inopportune time. If it weren’t for computers we wouldn’t be having this “conversation” right now would we? You know, “us” keeping in touch with one another is a nice thing! So the moral of this story is, “Don’t sweat the small stuff even though at the time it may seem like some major stuff!” Just take a breath and live life to the fullest because life is too short. Just join me on the river and later in the Red Dog relieving some stress and forgetting about the small stuff! Peace, Love, Whitewater