Thanks for Nothing!
Occasionally, I get advice from people who know nothing about my business, absolutely nothing. This is pretty much worthless advice. They aren’t business owners, they aren’t school photographers, and usually they are someone that really doesn’t have a clue on how the world works. How they manage to survive is beyond me. Regardless, sometimes I do get a golden flake of good advice after the yards of worthless and useless advice. Hmm, perhaps this is why I have a worthless advice blog? 
Now, if I’m in a brainstorming session with someone or a group of people, I love to hear every crazy idea they have. It is a free for all and the crazier the idea, the better. This is when I want those ideas no matter how worthless or ill conceived they might seem to be. Enjoy…toss out that new idea of how your cat can become the next bestseller! You have an idea for a novel? Spit it out! Maybe you have a desire for a wacky trip to New Zealand. Let’s go for it!

I do like to listen to people who have blazed a trail, made mistakes, and have beneficial advice because of their success and failures. I enjoy learning all about how they got there, the steps involved, and the process involved. That is the kind of advice you should listen to: advice from people that are where you want to be.

Enjoy your day!

Summer is over for my family; it’s dead and gone. School started for the kids last Monday and they actually attended a whole five days before the Labor Day Weekend. That is pretty usually for our school district. We usually go for two or three days, have the Labor Day weekend and they do a four day week. I’m not complaining and the kids aren’t complain either. They both seem excited to be going to school this year. That is always good for a parent to know that their children don’t hate school.

The weather has also turned into days of rain, clouds, cold temperatures, and windstorms. My white trash pool is full of debris and with no sunshine, the solar panels are not heating up the pool water so I’m not going inside it. I’m pretty sure the water in the pool is now 65 degrees F. In the middle of the pool is a pile of cedar branches. Oh, poor me, I have First World problems. 

With the disappearance of our wonderful sunny summer weather and the start of school, I’m back in the thick of my school photography season. Most of the prep work of my business has been taken care of but I still have schools booking into dates. I have one holdout where the principal has decided that she wants a new photographer. She is making it difficult for the PTA and I to book a date for school photos at her school. She blames me for her royal screw up. She is a narcissistic control freak who has to reinvent the wheel and touch every program. She believes she is an expert in everything (including school photographer and yearbook design and production). I’ve heard from various staff members, parents, and PTA members she is changing how everything is done in the school. Systems that worked fine in the past and that are time tested, refined, and work are now changed because “she has a better idea”.

I mentioned she blamed me for a failure on her part. I didn’t know she blamed me until the PTA president told me. Let’s take a trip back memory lane, to last spring. I’ve been trying to get the school to schedule the activity photo day for the yearbook group for months because the yearbook deadline was approaching. Little did I know the principal has to personal look at everything and had created a bottleneck in the communication process. Instead of a principal focusing on school administration, she is to focusing on micromanaging everything in the school building. I’m surprised she hasn’t personally told everyone to just have their email accounts come through her first.

In the past, for activity group/club/sport team photo day, we worked with the main office, had a time schedule, and the office would make an announcement that a certain group should now come down to have their photo taken. The system had worked for the past 15 years.

 Well, the Principal (brand new to the school) decided she didn’t want to do it that way. She decided that they would send runners to get the kids. She neglected to inform the teachers of the new process or me. She thought God would someone let us know.

So I’m photographing the various groups on time according to the time table and the schedule I was given. No one gave me rosters to check if the kids were all there or a walkie talkie for communication. No staff members came out to tell me that kids were “missing” from the photos. I was doing it the exact same way I have always done, you know, the way that actually worked.

So now the principal is trying to get rid of me because she blames me for her failed system. She doesn’t like to admit that, hey, she screwed up because she didn’t want to listen to her staff or the photographer with 22 years experience. We had a system that was time tested and worked. It has been refined and adjusted over the years by a team of people, not one person who had an “idea” of how to do it.

She also tried to get the PTA to purchase 300 yearbooks, when in the past, the PTA (I’m also a PTA member) has sold only 223 yearbooks in their best year (which was last year). We did not want to have unsold 75 yearbooks which the PTA would have had to eat the cost of. The PTA and I refused to do it so she took the yearbook project over and purchased 300 yearbooks with school funds. Did she sell 300 books? No, she didn’t. She has at least 50 yearbooks leftover that you and I (as taxpayers) paid for. That is at least $750.00 wasted (some estimates put unsold books at 75 copies for a loss of $1125.00). That’s money that could have been spent directly on the education of the school children in her school. She blames the lack of sales to kids missing from the yearbook group photos. Hmm, with a turnover of 400-500 kids out of 600 kids in the school per year, there isn’t a lot kids that stay a whole school year. Maybe if she knew her student population and the demographic make up of her families, she might have a better clue of how the yearbooks would sell. But again, why listen to historical sales figures. She must be a business expert too!

Now, I’m all for continuos improvement. I have a business degree from the University of Washington and have been in photography for 22 years, I know a little bit about how to photograph large number of people in a short amount of time. I also know about yearbooks and looking at past sales figures to project what future sales will be.. I like to improve sales because that leads to more business and profits for me. However, I will not take an order just for short term gain when I know the end product (in this case yearbooks) won’t be all sold. That’s bad business and bad business ethics.

I really dislike how this principal is trying to make me the scrape goat for her mismanagement. I’d like to go over her head and complain but I honestly don’t think the district cares about this problem. And the policy is usually to leave decisions up to the principal. The PTA and I have a school photo contract but the principal just says she wants to find a replacement for me.

I think a better solution is to contact the local newspaper or Jessie Jones from KIRO TV Channel 7 CBS news to talk with her. Ask why she is wasting taxpayers money and stealing money from the PTA (I pay them a commission from the school photo sales). With everything on her plate, I can’t imagine she will remember she also needs to book a school photographer. I’m hoping she forgets and then in November, when parents ask the school when “Photo Day is?”, she will be like “Oh, crap! I forgot I was trying to do a power play with the PTA and didn’t schedule a photographer for school photos!”. Of course, I suspect she is already talking with another photography company and will book with them. The PTA and I will be cut out, they will lose their commission, and the parents will get crappy school photos. So everyone wins, right
???

Off to 6th Grade Camp!

  
I’m off to 6th grade camp with about 87 students from my daughter’s elementary school. This is the first camp our school has done in four years. My son’s (who is currently in 10th grade) class was the first year our school didn’t do it because one teacher was the hold out. We even had replacement teachers willing to take her spot but that wasn’t good enough. That killed 6th grade camp until this year. The holdout teacher is now teaching 4th grade, we have new 6th grade teachers and magically we have 6th grade camp this year. 

Ok, it wasn’t magic. I do have to take my hat off to all the poor parents that fought for 6th grade camp to return the past four years. I thought it was gone forever. 

I’ve been to about seven Boy Scout camps over the past seven years, plus a few Cub Scout and Girl Scout day camps (as a volunteer staff member). I’m use to camping, camp good, and uncomfortable beds.

So today, I’m headed on a school bus, sitting next to a Boy Scout (he is in a different troop from than the one I lead). I’ve asked him ten questions and he has nodded seven times to answer my questions, and the other three answers were three words or less. I was also able to yell at the kids to “Shut up and listen to the bus driver!”, within the first five minutes of boarding the bus. I like to set the standard quickly that I will break you down and crush your spirit. Honestly, I’m not that bad once you get to know me. I just want to make sure the students know they can’t walk all over me; I’m not the softy. I like to have fun but let’s not be reckless, dangerous, or stupid about it. There is a time to shut up and listen and a time to laugh.

It should be a very interesting experience. We have great weather for the next three days and the student are excited. The parents and school teachers also seem excited. I’ll let you know how things turn out.

Jeez, I knew this was coming. With the lack of snow this winter and spring fast approaching, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that a drought situation was coming.  Last night, we heard that the Olympic Mountains are in a state of drought.  This means that us water whores in the Seattle area need to be worried.  Pretty soon our Cascade Mountian Range will most likely be in a state of drought as well.

 We may be forced to turn to our swimming pools and hot tubs to water our huge lawns over the summer. I’m seriously worried that I won’t be able to relax knowing my water bill may skyrocket when the water district jacks up the price of water to combat folks like me that just leave our garden hoses running.

Frankly, we live in the Pacific Northwest so we know it is our right to allow water to pour out of our faucets without a care in the world.  Sorry California and other dry states, we usually don’t have a drought problem in soggy Seattle so we don’t care about your “feelings” about conserving water.

But now I am concerned about water and that sucks. One of the benefits of living here in Washington is the massive snowpack we get during the winter that allows us to not care about how much water we use. I might actually have to think about my water use.  That isn’t fun for me.  I shouldn’t have to think about water.  I should just able to swim, waterski, or drink water without a care in the world.

Sigh.  Now this summer will probably shape up to be a “water restrictions” summer. Great. We will be like Texas or California but without the sunshine and heat.

Thanks for reading…I’m off to turn on my neighbor’s faucet to fill up my pool.



In the Seattle and Puget Sound area, our cold winter weather is nowhere to be seen. Our snow pack in the mountains is low so most likely we will have a drought in the Puget Sound area. However, this has allowed us to do some great little hikes we usually wouldn’t do this time of year.

This past Saturday, I went with Boy Scout Troop 480 to the Greenwater Lakes off of Highway 410. These lakes are a little outside the town of Greenwater, Washington. The hike to the Greenwater Lakes is a flat hike of about two miles with an elevation gain of maybe 800-1000 feet. We logged in a total of 7 miles round trip after we hiked past the Greenwater Lakes, had lunch, and back to the car.  Trail is fairly dry but there are mud patches. 











We used our water filters to get some mountain fresh water from the river for lunch. As you can see from the photos, we cooked up some Mountain House meals for a hot lunch on a cool, winter day.

Access to the trailhead is along paved Forest Service roads.  I estimate 10 miles out of Greenwater. You will need to pay a day use fee or have a Northwest Forest Pass to park in the parking lot.

Thanks for reading!