Worst day of the summer

I'm so glad that yesterday is over because July 28 was undoubtedly the worst day of the summer.

It started out like most days this summer, with me waking up at 4 a.m. to get ready for my internship down at 570 KLIF. But when I left KLIF, I went home to change before my 9 a.m. demo. When I got to my demo, I realized I had forgotten my bluebook (the binder with all the pictures of the different knives), so I only sold half of what I should have to that customer.

After that, I made a quick stop at the eye doctor before heading up to Richardson for a group demo. For the record, I hate group demos. They are never as good as a rep thinks they'll be. I thought that this was going to be a great demo. As it turns out, I - like most people going into group demos - was disappointed.

Two of the ladies there weren't in the demographic we typically show Cutco to, the man there was more interested in the female rep there who had set up the demo, and the other woman probably would have bought a small set had she not been in a group setting where no one else was getting anything.

When I escaped that beating, I got on to the George Bush Turnpike to head over to Lewisville, which is where I was when I got pulled over for goign 75 in a 60. While 15 mph sounds like a lot over the speed limit, I was going with the flow of traffic. The ticket definitely helped to just ruin my day.

So when I finally got to Lewisville, Brian decided to take me to Six Flags in Arlington. We had fun for a while but when it came time for me to leave, I walked out of the park, and I reached into my pocket to get my car keys. Too bad the keys weren't in my pocket. I had left them in the park. I had left them somewhere in the huge amusement park. At this point, I was already late to get to Lewisville to run a meeting.

I tried to get back in to the park, but because I didn't get my hand stamped as I left, they weren't letting me back in. One guy told me that if I wanted to get back in, I should have gotten my hand stamped. I told him I didn't know I'd be going back in, but it was only because I lost my car keys. He said that's exactly why I needed my hand stamped. I paused and considered punching the guy in the head.

Eventually, I found a cop who agreed to escort me into the park to the lost and found. I waited at the lost and found in the line for about 10 minutes before being helped. When I got to the front of the line, I described my keychain and thankfully the guy had it. He put it on the counter and asked me to fill out some survey or something before I left because I needed to do something to take back my keys. Well, when the guy turned around to get something from a back shelf, I took the keys and took off. I definitely did not have time for that!

I bolted out of the park and to my car, where I got in and got going. While I was on state highway 360, I started feeling sick because of the roller coasters. I hate roller coasters. Yesterday was my first time on a corkscrewing roller coaster, and it was most likely my last. I decided to pull over to the side of the road, get out, and throw up. I definitely felt a little better after that.

So from there, I continued driving up to Lewisville, but as in-a-hurry as I was, I couldn't speed. I couldn't risk a second ticket for the day. I finally got to Lewisville, only 45 minutes after I was supposed to be there. When I got there, someone was already giving the talk I was going to give because they didn't know how long it'd be until I got there.

So I had basically driven up to Lewisville for nothing. Awesome.

I really hope I don't have another day like this for a while, because I really don't enjoy it. This definitely was the back-breaker of the summer.

Irregardless

This morning on NBC's newscast, there was a story by Brian Mooar, who I assume is just some networ nut who did his national story and sent it out to affiliate stations. The story was about Democratic senators cracking down on internet pornography, but that's really not the point.

The point is that at the end of this story, Mooar said the following sentence:

"Senator Lincoln's office maintains that this is good legislation, irregardless of Third Way's involvement."

Does he not know that irregardless isn't an actual word? It is improper grammar and just annoying to hear someone say. Don't believe me? You don't have to.

I looked it up on www.dictionary.com to find out what one internet dictionary had listed for the word. The following paragraph returned from my search:

[Probably blend of irrespective, and regardless.]
Usage Note: Irregardless is a word that many mistakenly believe to be correct usage in formal style, when in fact it is used chiefly in nonstandard speech or casual writing. Coined in the United States in the early 20th century, it has met with a blizzard of condemnation for being an improper yoking of irrespective and regardless and for the logical absurdity of combining the negative ir- prefix and -less suffix in a single term. Although one might reasonably argue that it is no different from words with redundant affixes like debone and unravel, it has been considered a blunder for decades and will probably continue to be so.

No time for sleep

After Monday's Summer Conference II in Grapevine, I went out for a night on the town with a few other Vector reps and managers as a reward for being one of the top sales reps from the conference. The 20 of us (including top reps, winning managers and the division manager) boarded a party bus and went to dinner at Fogo De Chao. We drove around Dallas before going to The Dome in Reunion Tower.

The night that started just after the conference around 6:30 p.m. ended at midnight. At that point, I stayed up past 3 a.m. talking to another rep I met on the party bus, Anna. Apparently, when you combine the propensity for constant talking that we both share, no one gets any sleep. We talked until about 3:15 a.m. before I finally went to bed for 45 minutes - after all, I did have to wake up at 4 a.m. for my internship.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed talking with Anna a lot - although she did make me feel like crap because I never single-handedly tried to solve world hunger (she's one of the truly good people in the world) - but I hadn't slept since 4 a.m. Monday morning.

Now I was expected to go to my internship having slept 45 minutes of the past 24 hours. Needless to say, that didn't work out too well.

When I got to my internship, the lady I work for let me go after about an hour because it was such a slow news day and I was so tired. Thank God! I went home and got some much-needed sleep.

"Are you tired?"

This moring, a gas-station clerk asked me a question that I felt didn't need asking. As I paid for my chocolate milk and muffin (I eat the best breakfasts!), he asked me, "So, are you tired this morning?"

Am I tired this morning?

Well, yeah.

Consider the fact that if you look at a clock it will tell you that it is not yet 5 a.m. here in the Central Time Zone. As a general rule, I think someone should never ask the question "are you tired this morning?" before 6 a.m. Anytime before then, there's no need to ask.

Scholarship race

This summer, while working with Vector, I've been in a big scholarship race. Everyone who works with the company this summer and is in school has a chance to win.

Last summer, I came pretty close to winning, but because the scholarship race is based on sales, and because I went back to school two weeks before the end of the summer campaign, I got passed the last week of the summer and dropped out of the top 50.

This year, I hit the contenders list June 24, when I reached 11,025 in sales for the summer. I was 106 in the company with room to go for the scholarship. With only a month left in the scholarship running, I decided I'd post my progress with the scholarship competition:

DATE ******* NATIONAL RANK *** $OLD
June 24 ***** 106 *************** 11,025
July 1 ******* 42 **************** 16,523
July 8 ******* 44 **************** 19,114
July 15 ****** 34 **************** 23,162
July 22 ****** 30 **************** 27,123

I'll make sure to update each week for the rest of the summer campain to let yall know how I am doing.

Commenting on comments concerning Cutco

Once again, I feel the need to respond to someone who insists on posting comment after comment on my blog about Vector Marketing. This will, however, be my last response to these comments because - quite frankly - I'm getting a little tired of dealing with this guy who keeps doing this.

If you haven't been keeping up with this ongoing online "feud" just take a look at these past posts and comments:
Top Dog (June 21, 2005) + comments
Response to recent comments... (June 22) + comments
Defending Vector: a response to more comments (July 17) + comments

Please stop referring to this as a "job" with your retarded quotation marks. This is a job, regardless of how uncommon or unique it is and regardless of how much you don't like it.

You say that the company will take every single person, but that's not entirely true. Would the company like more sales reps, yeah, of course they would, but why would they want to hire a moron to show their product and make the company look bad. I'm sure there are some managers who hire anyone with a pulse, but I also know that some managers hire only truly qualified, clean-cut kids who need some extra money and are strongly motivated. How do I know? I work for one of those offices.

Now this next comment of your, I just don't understand: "The only ones they seem not to accept are those who are not young, naive, and inexperienced because they are the only ones who don't know any better."

First of all, just as a personal pet-peeve, don't use a sentence with a triple-negative. It's just tough reading.

Okay, so you're saying the company only hires young, naive and inexperienced people because they "don't know any better." Where do I even begin with this??? Okay, first off, young inexperienced people are hired by a lot of companies all the time every day. Someone has to get a first job somewhere. Mine happened to be editing an SAT workbook. For other kids, it's bagging groceries. And for some, yes, it's working with Vector. That's probably one of the greatest things about this company, the fact that no experience is necessary. It's a great resume builder.

As far as the naivity of new sales reps, what does that have to do with anything? People are told at the interview what the job entails. If they don't wanna show Cutco to people, they are more than free to walk out of the interview. They aren't chained down. We don't lock the doors. Walk out if you don't like it. But don't say that those who are coming to the office looking for a job don't know what they'll be doing when they leave. They know the details of the job.

The fact that you say that those hired "don't know any better" is insane. Some of the best Vector reps are personal recruits of a friend who works with the company. That rep tells their other friend who is looking for some extra cash about his job, so the friend goes in, knowing all about what this job is.

Is it true that some people go in to the interview not knowing exactly what they'll be doing? Absolutely. But that can be said about many positions where you don't know the specific details of a job until it is explained to you at an interview - which is exactly what Vector does.

Me personally, I went in to the interview not knowing what I'd be doing, but who cares. The manager explained the job to me. I thought it sounded like fun, so when he offered me the job, I shook his hand and said "thanks" because I wanted to do this. Other people don't take the job because they don't like it, but if someone doesn't want to do the job, they don't have to.

I really don't feel like answering any more of your bickering comments, but if there is some reason you feel so strongly against this company, I've gotta hear this personal vendetta. Did you get a job with Vector, not do well, blame it on others, and set out a mission in life to destroy this company? Or are you just jealous that friends of yours can make $20K in a summer while you bust your ass and make $2K? I don't know your life's story. I don't care about most of it. But why do you honestly feel the need to - in your mind - educate the world about what you think are the "evils" of a good company?

How 'bout them triplets

When I heard the other day that the triplets - the original triplets - were going to be inducted into the Cowboys' Ring of Honor together, I thought it was one of the best calls Jerry has made since buying the 'Boys.

Troy Aikman. Emmitt Smith. Michael Irvin. The triplets.

There may have been others, but none were better. Aikman led the Cowboys to three Super Bowl wins. Irvin put up Jerry Rice-like numbers until an injury cut-short a Hall of Fame career. And Smith ran his way into the record books with 18,355 career rushing yards.

When the three amigos are inducted into the Ring of Honor, I have made it a point to fly back to Dallas for the game, a Monday Night Football game against the hated Washington Redskins in the home opener.

Growing up watching the triplets do there thing and do it well was one of the greatest experiences ever. As a kid in Dallas, nothing was bigger than the Dallas Cowboys, and on the Cowboys, no one was bigger than the triplets - not even Jerry.

They got to Dallas in consecutive years. Irvin was drafted in 1988 - and when he left the NFL, he was last player to play for Tom Landry to retire. Aikman entered the league in 1989, and Smith made his way to Dallas the next year as part of the Herschel Walker deal.

Until Irvin's untimely retirement, the triplets dominated football. The beginning of the end didn't come until Michael didn't get up from the solid turf of The Vet as half of Philadelphia cheered his injury (don't get me started!).

People talk now about Peyton Manning, Edgerine James and Marvin Harrison being the "new triplets." Until they do what the Cowboys' version of the triplets did, they will be nothing more than three good football players on the same team.

Any team can assemble three good football players, but until they can come together to dominate their positions at the same time while dominating the entire National Football League, they will not compare with the triplets.

HOW 'BOUT THEM COWBOYS!
HOW 'BOUT THEM TRIPLETS!

Defending Vector (a response to more comments)

If you don't like the company, them you can probably live a life without Vector and Cutco. I'm not saying it's a job that EVERYONE can succeed at, because I believe it does take some special skills, but don't this idea that the company wants its reps to quit after selling to family and friends is legit either. Go to any Vector conference and you'll see.

Secondly, the job is NOT for everyone. That's why not everyone interviewed is hired, and that's why not everyone hired starts.

Also, as far as the comments on the sample kit deposit, I could turn my kit in tomorrow and get a FULL REFUND if that's what you want to call it. People do it every day.

When it comes to sales reps not getting paid, don't think people try to scam this company when they start out all the time. Reps will turn in full forms of 10 people they "went to see" but they will all be no-sales. Out of 10 people, no one bought anything.

Managers then have to call the names and numbers of those people to see if they really did the demos. If the people never heard of the kid or never saw the demo (which happens virtually every time someone hands in a 0-for-10 sheet), then that rep should not be paid and chances are will not be paid.

Forging paperwork won't earn you crap with this company and in life. Those who think they've done such a clever job of filling up a sheet with 10 names of strangers or fake people but then come back to Advanced Training with a full bag of rope and leather they were supposed to cut up on the presentation have no reason to be paid because they didn't do their job.

I'm not saying you have to love a company that you don't work for - that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm just saying that there are students who succeed at this job every day. About 60,000 college-age kids will work with Vector this summer, and those who don't will be missing out on something that can truly change lives.

I don't know who your are because you keep posting annonymously, but you seriously need to just drop it. This company isn't going away soon. I really think you should focus your attention elsewhere.

Instead of hating a company you don't work for, why not try finding a job with a company you won't hate? Who knows, you might actually enjoy working for that company, despite what others think about it, and then you'll know how I feel.

[READ THE RECENT POST BEING DISCUSSED AND ATTACHED COMMENTS]
[SEE THE POST THAT SPARKED THIS DISCUSSION AND ITS COMMENTS]