Crystal Trino's Journal Sep 17 2006 Entry

September 17. Sunday Night.

Hi Journey.

My body offered a deal on sleep today. "Get with it and bag at least twelve hours in bed this weekend, or else…" my legs said to me yesterday morning at six as I was rolling over to shut off the cell phone alarm before heading down to CoHo. Of course, my legs don’t speak in English; they speak in Pain. My right calf wrenched itself into a paralyzing Charlie Horse. "Back to bed. I’m on strike," my calf said. "Get some sleep."

So I did. Slept in until noon and then just spent rest of yesterday surfing the web. Journey I so horribly wish I could just jump on a jumbo jetliner and fly to Heathrow for the London Design Festival this week. Instead I just browsed their website. Most of the photos were from last year’s festival, but then I happened across a listing for Patricia Urquiola. Of course, that spawned more hopping across the web, and soon I was at the Artelano furniture site, sifting through images of delightful chairs that would fit perfectly in some of our Brentwood client’s homes.

And suddenly I wished Casey was here with me so I could wade through the French version of the site. Sure, the English on the site seems quite good but since it’s a French company I’m sure the vibrancy of the descriptions must be better in the mother tongue

Of course, Urquiola is Spanish, so the soul of her chairs shines through, regardless of language.

And then it hit me: What if Crystal Designs sponsored a contest for a getaway-for-two to the Festival next year for our clients? It could certainly be easy enough to set up. I’d simply enter every one of our clients automatically and then send out an announcement. Or as an alternative we might even create a contest form on the newsletter and ask people to send us an email or give us a ring to let us know they’re interested in being entered.

And then, of course, the lucky winner would jaunt off to London to attend next year’s show. Afterward we could have a great client party and have the winner present a little slide-show overview of their trip.

I think it’d be just smashing, J.

Of course all the costs and can’ts cascaded into my mind immediately. Too much money, hassle, time away, lack of focus from our core group…blah, blah, blah.

Nevermind. I shoved the accountant’s half of my brain aside and let the promotional wheels turnabout at high speed for an hour. Tuesday I’m going to bring the notion up at the Bloom Team meeting.

Guess my legs didn’t lie--I needed to rest. This contest is the first truly good idea I’ve had in a month.

Goodnight, Journey