Chaos Attraction

Theory Testing: WEF, Part 3

2004-05-09, 10:25 p.m.

On Sunday, I was filled with hope. I spent the morning creating new sets of earrings and fixing the tile and butterfly bracelets to have adjustable chain lengths so anyone could wear them. I had new cheapass prices. Things would have to sell, right?

Not so much, no.

I think I can clearly say that my theory of making things cheaper did NOT make my necklaces sell any better. I suppose it's just that my style isn't all that liked by most people, then. Today ended up even slower, which was frustrating. Seemed like whoever I sat next to had a banner day, while I felt kinda embarrassed.

We, the few, the proud, the sunburned had a discussion that morning as to whether or not we had used crappy/incorrect sunscreen since we'd gotten burned anyway, or if sunscreen just doesn't work when in direct sunlight all day. The CC manager finally decided it when she told us about how she went to Surf Camp one year and they all used tons of sunscreen and got burned. They got together and pooled their sunscreen stashes and did some testing...and none of them worked at all. So I'm thinking the "sunscreen just doesn't work under certain hot circumstances" theory is correct.

I found myself having Thoughts at some people. Somewhat nasty thoughts. Like the girl who swooned over the butterfly jewelry, saying she had to have it, and when her friend told her it was $8, she walked off. I was all, "Give me a break! $8 is too expensive?! How much more ridiculously cheap do I have to GET?!" Okay, for all I know she was broke, but I did find myself having scary thinking like that. I started to notice exactly when people's interest would drop in my stuff. I'd notice that teenagers and the like weren't going for it, and anyone with kids wasn't doing too much either.

Sometimes I was all, can some of you people PLEASE be a little more tactful with the comments in front of me, please? "Oh, I like these earrings, but they're too dangly."

Even more fun there was this one guy who saw my booth and made a beeline for it. He obviously wasn't attracted to me, just the jewelry, which was flattering. He really wanted to buy something from me for his mom. Unfortunately for me, his mom was all, "Oh, I need to give away all of my things, I have too much, don't buy me anything, ooh, these earrings are great, don't buy me anything, honey, oh, I LOVE this frog necklace! It just feels right! I'll do a round and then come back." She didn't either.

The Fimo stuff seemed to get the most looked at, with many people coming by and saying "Ooh, Fimo!" I also got a lot of kids coming by to look at my stuff. Unfortunately, kids looking at my stuff was pretty useless since parents are of the "I already bought you something, you are NOT getting that" ilk. One guy had the nerve to tell his 6-year-old in front of me that she could make those kinds of beads at home or have someone from the CC teach her how. For one, ain't no way a 6-year-old is going to be up to making millefiore beads at home. For two, the CC doesn't teach anyone under 18 most of the time, except for Kids Camp. And for three, to my knowledge they don't teach clay bead making. I seriously had to restrain my mouth.

Nobody went for any of my new or fixed stuff, or my newly cheapened major things. I was stunned.

My parents came by at about 2 p.m. "Have you sold anything yet?" Nope. They wandered off to go look around. While they were gone, I sold something! One woman came along and said the blue flower necklace matched a bracelet she got in San Diego. Yay! Isn't this picture cute?

My parents came back, and this time Mom checked out my stuff. Much to my amazement (she normally isn't into buying stuff from me for the sake of daughterdom), she bought the pink bracelet and the photo frame necklace. At this point Mom watched the booth for me while I went to get food, since I was starving.

Problem being, all the vendor food at WEF is all vegan/organic/hippie/no meat allowed stuff. Not that I normally have objections to vegetarian/organic stuff, because I don't, but the food selection is...iffy. I ended up paying $7 for what they labeled "pizza" but was really a small piece of wet bread sopping with pesto and tomatoes. There's nothing quite like Whole Earth food to suddenly make me want to eat steak. And I don't even LIKE steak. I was still hungry after eating it.

I went back to the booth, I waited some more, but nothing else went on. Mom bought a handmade pen from a lady at my table for her boss. The lady promptly said, "I think that's the cheesiest pen, but everyone loves it." I'm all "For Mom's boss, cheesy is appropriate."

At 5:30, I started cleaning up, and thank gawd the parents were there with the van to haul the cage back in. (Later on, Heather said I could keep the cage if I was going to use it. Hee.) We went home to drop it off, went out for Mother's Day/birthday, then they dropped me off for ASL practice at a girl in my class's house. After that, I came home and collapsed.

Very, very tired. Definitely need to veg as much as I can this coming weekend.


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