When I left home on August 18, my only concern was getting through the last long home stand of the Potomac Nationals and then getting Big Red out of Pfitzner Stadium and down to Richmond for a Big Dogs event at Richmond Raceway. Little did I know that would be the easiest thing I did during the whole period.

The home stand started on Thursday and had a very small presale of tickets. I decided to save a little labor and told Erin I didn't need her and that Justin and I would handle the game. With only 200 tickets out and rain in the forecast, I figured on a game of something pitiful like $50 sales. Wrong. It never rained and we got hammered, had a really good night considering I had to pull Justin out of the stands to help in Big Red.

Friday, the presale was better so I had Erin and Justin. It rained and the game was postponed and rescheduled on Saturday as a double header. After four years of doing these games, I know a double header means virtually nothing in sales. We never do twice what we should in a regular game and actually are lucky to hold with normal sales for a given day. Since it was Saturday, I knew it would still be a good day but I didn't make any adjustments for the double header. Wrong again.

We got hit hard starting early and it stayed that way. I even ran out of lemons and sugar in the second inning of the second game after selling 74 gallons of lemonade. We probably would have gone over 100 gallons if I had the product. Still it was a huge game ranking right up there with the 4th of July and the Strasburg game.

Sunday was another good lemonade game after I scrambled all over Woodbridge trying to find cases of lemons on a Sunday morning but all in all not a great game.

Monday was an off night and Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were all pretty much what I expected for mid-week games. However, by then, we were getting the forecast for Irene and the chances of her hitting Virginia.

I was afraid getting Red out of the stadium would be difficult because of the tight quarters and all of the tables in the area. Wrong again. After hooking up, and one short back-up, I pulled straight out and was on my way to Richmond in a matter of minutes.

Friday morning, I dropped Big Red off at the raceway, tried to convince the Big Dogs folks to cancel, and did my shopping. I also cancelled Peggy out of helping and sent she and Kagen home from Allison before the storm hit. The only good thing was that the event was moved from one of the parking lots to the pavillion so we were at least out of the weather.

It was raining when I got there Saturday morning, did my prep and set up work and opened at 9. I was actually far busier than I thought and was having a pretty good day when the Hurricane hit hard. Even though we were under the pavillion, the Big Dog folks ended it early and I shut down about 1pm. With hard rains and winds, I knew better than trying to pull Big Red home, so I went back to the motel to ride out Irene. Thankfully, I hit McDonald's on the way so I had something to eat.

With weather on the TV, and firing to Facebook and Twitter, I was set.

Wrong. About 6:30pm, I heard what sounded like an explosion and we lost power.  No TV, no weather updates and no way of knowing what else was happening. I immediately started having withdrawal symptoms. Even though I had an offer to go to Allison's apartment which had power then, I didn't want to drive in that insanity, plus I knew I couldn't get back in my room (electronic locks) until the power came back on. When I left this morning, there was still no power in that section of Richmond.

When I left home, nobody had even heard of Irene so I wasn't prepared. I don't even carry a flashlight so I just sat there in the dark chain smoking and drinking Diet Coke.

Richmond looked like a warzone. And it took me three different routes before I made it to RIR to retrieve Big Red. Once I got out of town, everything was OK and getting back to normal.

I feel really bad for anyone that was caught by Irene, but especially for my friends in Richmond. And, I realize that in the wide scheme of things, Richmond was not one of the more devastated areas. But, having been through it there, I fell a little differently. I've heard that as many as 60% of Richmond is without power and that some could be weeks getting it back. And this wasn't a hard hit area?

Trust me, in that situation again, I'll get the hell out of Dodge before it hits, not after.

This weekend is the last home stand of the year on Saturday, Sunday and Labor Day. I won't run out of lemons again.

One of this year's craziest weeks is over just as another one begins. Last week we ran simultaneously at the Pfitz and Watkins Glen International Raceway.

The PNat home stand began on Monday. I worked the first two games with Justin and Erin and Tank took over on Wednesday and ran things through Sunday while I headed to New York. With the help of Mike, Nigel, Casey and Christina it was a great week, mainly due to Friday night's rehab appearance by Stephen Strasburg. That game was a sellout, was hot and we sold tons of lemonade (75 pounds of sugar by the 2nd inning). Nigel had an exceptional night hawking as well. While that game fell just short of being a record breaker, it was still a very good night for Big Red. Saturday, usually our best night was a disappointment as the rains moved in but still a fair night. Oddly, on Sunday, we sold only 2 funnel cakes and 1 mini-funnel cake but bailed the day out with our lemonade sales.

Meanwhile, Peggy and I drove to Watkins Glen on Wednesday and set up our two locations on Thursday. We had one slight problem. While setting up stand 1, the trashmen grabbed one of my trashcans setting next to the tent that was loaded with supplies like powdered sugar containers, tongs, plates and funnel cake pitchers. Dumped them in the trash truck never to be seen again. We did some heavy duty scrambling to replace all of that stuff at the last minute but somehow got it done.

We opened Stand 1 on Friday, located right up from the start/finish line and had a suprisingly good day. Chuck, Ryan, Justin, Erin, and two newcomers, Joe and Jessica all arrived Friday and were ready to go on Saturday morning. At Stand 2, we also offered chicken tenders, fries and chicken sandwiches, plus lemonade to go with our funnel cakes, footlong corn dogs and pizza logs we were offering at Stand 1. Stand 2 was right at the end of the last turn. Had a car missed that turn they might have ended up in our tent.

We got through Saturday OK but the rains came on Sunday causing the race to be postponed until Monday. It was also brutally cold for camping after our bodies had become accustomed to 100+ degree days. 40 and rain was awful so our evenings featured lots of blankets.

My sales for the race was up from last year despite the much smaller crowd on Monday. But, in the end, Watkins Glen was at best a breakeven proposition for us as our expenses run super high with the rental of a big truck, rental of a golf cart at the track and the costs of travel for 8 people.

Thankfully, Strasburg made our week so in the end, it was a profitable period.

The next home stand starts tomorrow at the Pfitz so I'll be on the road again for the next 10 days. After the last game next Thursday, I have to move Big Red down the road to Richmond Raceway for another Big Dogs Offroad event on Saturday. The following week, (Labor Day) is the last home stand of the season followed by the Richmond Race, JMU football and Liberty football all at the same time. And you wonder why I'm a little crazy?

NOTE: Sorry about the pictures, folks. I'm having some kind of technical download issues.

I haven't done a 'Ravings' post for sometime. If you are new to these highly intellectual pages, 'Ravings' are a bunch of totally disjointed thoughts bouncing around in my head that haven't fit into any recent posts. 

First, the biz stuff.

Last weekend was a short 3 game home stand of the Pnats at Pfitzner Stadium. With the heat, which was brutal all weekend, I wasn't counting on doing many funnel cakes but assumed our fresh squeezed lemonade would rock. What I didn't count on was that the heat would keep attendance numbers well below expectations and presold tickets.  That, in fact, is what happened as actual fannies in the seats was off almost 50% for the 3 games. As a result, the home stand was not great. Did I mention the heat? On Big Red with all three fryers going, the air temperature hit 131.

Justin, who usually is my hawker in the stands was outstanding as he came up with a bunch of witty sayings for lemonade that the fans enjoyed. Nigel handled the hawking duties on Saturday and was outstanding in his first effort at that job.

My major disappointment was our second stand on the third base side that we opened on Saturday. It absolutely bombed and I don't think we'll do that again until next summer for the 4th of July.

This week is off so I've spent my time in the pool, working on next week, and catching up on administrative junk for the fall, like health department permits, price boards for football games and some changing  menus.

Next week is awful as I will be stretched to the max. Monday starts a 7 game home stand in Woodbridge. I'll work the first two games then head to Watkins Glen, NY for the NASCAR races. Tank will take over the PNats games.

At the Glen, I'll have two locations and the second one has been moved to a much higher volume location. So, I'm expecting my volume to be up considerably. I just hope we have good weather, not only for the business, but because we're camping there and I'd hate to see my tent over Vermont due to a storm. As I was writing this, my menu was changed again at that location to include chicken tenders and fries and some other things if I can work it out this late.

For some unknown reason, the past couple of weeks has seen an unprecedented increase in my followers on Twitter. I find this a bit odd as I'm not doing anything differently and quite frankly, I'm not known for anything more than an occasional laugh or two and to keep those few people who know me aware of what is happening in my crazy world. So, if you are new to my Twitter stream, and therefiore new to Big Red, I have a couple of rules that I adhere to at all times. First, I follow back anyone that follows me and love to engage in any direct conversations when I'm in my office. This is more difficult when I'm on the road as I still don't have a laptop and use my phone for postings.

Second, if you are what I call a Blaster, one who sends multiple tweets via an automatic program, I'll unfollow you in a heartbeat. If a get six or eight tweets at once, no matter what the content, you're gone. Beyond that, I'm open to anything. 

My son, known to many of you as @JasonFalls, is soon to join several other members of the Falls clan as a published author. Great granddaddy Wille (Shakespeare) and Cuz John (Grisham) are amazed at his efforts with Eric Deckers. Seriously, No Bullshit Social Media, the All-Business, No-Hype Guide to Social Media Marketing, will be in the book stores in October. But, it can now be ordered through Amazon.com or via the website, www.nobullshitsocialmedia.com. Please check it out and order lots of copies.

I'll be posting a lot via my phone to both Twitter and Facebook during the week and will recap everything when I get back.

The All-Business,
No-Hype Guide
to Social Media Marketi