So Friday, I get the mail, and here's a dunning notice from the city of Asheville saying I haven't paid my parking ticket from August yet. This is news to me, as I never saw a parking ticket in August, or any month this year. I try to call, and of course their system's down. On to the next item in the mail, which is a reject notice from an exhibition in New York that I was hoping to get into. Then on the news at 11, there's a comment that two out-of-the-way railroad crossings are going to be closed for several days starting on Sunday. These two crossings happen to be the ones that are critical to traffic in Asheville's River Arts District, and of course THIS is the weekend of the River Arts District Studio Stroll! Oh, yes, this weekend is off to a flying start!
Saturday starts off okay: the weather is nice and we hear that the closing notice is erroneous. Whew, dodged that bullet! On to the studio, and here come the thousands of visitors eager to buy our art. Well, hundreds of them, anyway ... and not at all eager, as it turns out. After all day in the studio, I sold a grand total of one (count 'em, 1) poster for $20. I'd even made a special effort to put away the political stuff and get out the happy pictures. To no avail.
Sunday was a disaster. It was cold and windy. I got down there early to set up the information tent and there were the railroad guys ripping up the crossties out of the intersection, which was now closed for the next several days. So the information that the report was erroneous was itself erroneous. We put up my tent for the information booth and it blew over inside of ten minutes, bending a couple of support braces and rendering it inoperative for the duration. I got the tent workers resettled in another location (next to a coffeeshop, so they were happy), then went out to relocate some of our directional signs to show visitors the convoluted detour route around the damn railroad guys. Ever tried to pound one of those cheap signs into packed roadside gravel? Try eight of 'em.
I finally got back to the studio about two hours after the Stroll officially began. As it turned out, I probably could've gone home instead. Very few visitors and nothing else sold. Not even a poster.
I spent all today framing a bunch of etchings for a show here in town. Went to the building to hang it and found out that the company sponsoring the show is no longer in business. Ergo, no show. Bummo.
Do you remember the "Lil Abner" comic strip? I think that was the strip that had one character who walked around with a raincloud over his head all the time. That's been me since Friday. The wonderful lady who arranged the show asked me this evening if my raincloud was contagious.
Sigh.
What can ya do? Rant in your blog, bitch and moan, then get up in the morning and keep on plugging. What else is there?
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