Guitar Heroes, Geocachers, Fashion Shows & random Brightness

What a day so far. Arguably the most productive and pleasing of 2010, congratulations to Thursday 4th February, never knew you had it in you.

Lots of things have come together well today. Instead of hanging about waiting for answers to questions, they've jumped straight up and said "hello". Which equally means I've been able to get on with things.

#1 good vibe came when I met with Rachel @Varsity Harborne. I swear she probably cringes whenever she sees me, which has so far been twice. But no, she was lovely and helpful and even though she's returning to Southampton next week she's booked in our Guitar Hero night for the 25th Feb. I haven't been 100% sure about this event, but we've got the venue, now to get the xbox, playstation or wii and the Guitar Hero equipment! I enjoy working backwards.




#2 was requesting Outdoor Show tickets as prizes for the Geocaching event 'The Big Search' and getting a green light. They're in the post. Again, not sure on the event, but worth a shot. Again, now I have 20 odd GPS receivers to find.

#3 was the freebies and promotion that Kathy @ UK Geocachers offered without me really asking. Lovely people. Must go visit sometime.

#4 was the offer of help running a Fashion Show event. Just need to work on the timing of that one. I did want to fit it in with our Awareness event 'Wear Bright for Sight' but not to be, we can do it earlier though, so will look in to that one.

#5 was a lovely note left for me by one of our volunteers who I haven't met but eager to help out. The one thing I need more of here is more help, especially to run ideas past and generally keep me sane.

So, there you go, for me to find 5 good things happen before 4pm, well that's unheard of. And maybe because I chose to walk to work this morning. Normally I'd hop on the bike but this morning we'd got the kids ready early so I had plenty of time. I love listening to my ipod, so I thought it'd give me chance to listen to some music.

One of the first songs on shuffle was Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More. That song really hits a note with me at the moment, I thought a lot about mum, which made me a bit sad.

But I love the drum beat and the bass, and when that was followed by Foo Fighters Everlong, well, I was well in the mood for a good day at work and kicking some ass.

I love music, I can't play any instruments, despite having an awesome red saxophone! I'd love to play the drums or the guitar, especially bass. But I'm not that type of person really, I don't have the will power and commitment to learn, I also don't have the time and would rather spend the time cycling if I could. It's too wet tonight, so that's out the window.

So, Thursday has been a good day, who knew :-)

Event #2 - The Aussie Barbie

My second event since starting at Focus Birmingham was the Aussie Barbie on saturday.

The concept of the event...an outdoor BBQ with indoor activities, in Birmingham as close to Australia Day (26th Jan) as poss. Well, I'm pleased with the actual running of the event, but we simply didn't have enough people there. Understandable I guess, a BBQ in winter in the UK, where as I thought it was quirky some people might thing crazy.

As pointed out, people tell me it's a learning curve. Well, that might be true, but I'm 30 this year and been doing fundraising for 5 years now. I know that's not that long, but seriously, you'd have thought I'd have learnt a bit more by now.

Perhaps I need to re-address the quirkyness of my event ideas. When I first started here at Focus I had a list of about 10 ideas, none of them were particular 'regular' events. Am I being too specialist? Creating events that I might like doesn't mean there are people like me out there.

I need to make my budget of about £8000 by the end of March. Yep, that's less than 2 months away now. Without being defeatist I can't see any way of me making that much money by doing regular events, and besides, I've learnt that a good event is promoted early on, not 4 weeks before it.

But it doesn't mean I can sit pretty for February, I have to bring in some money, so I'm looking at a Guitar Hero or Rock Band fundraiser, a dance night, either Strictly or Salsa esque, or even a Memphis Belle type theme night. With a bit of a man power I could maybe do all 3, but I don't know, it'll be a push.

I also wondered over the weekend whether I'm sending mixed messages via Twitter, and this blog to be honest. I started on Twitter purely for personal purposes, an opportunity to engage with people I don't know and perhaps will never meet, yet still have enthralling conversations with.

But as I learnt more of Twitter, I learnt that it's an excellent marketing tool. And as I tweet about me, how can I not tweet about my work. We do have a Twitter account for work, but I don't control it. And if I did it would be purely events based. Perhaps I feel that without marketing events personally myself I won't be able to get people along. But then on a daily basis that is me. For work I have to sell myself and the charity to get people on events. See, it's very confusing.

I'll publish more Aussie Barbie photos in the week I hope.

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