Please let us know what you think would help make next year even better.
I'll start.
Maybe it would be a good idea to have a special area that is a quiet campground for those who really want to sleep.
Two stages?
I've always wanted a photo booth.
It might be fun to have a door prize. To qualify you have to sign up - that way we get an accurate head count and info on how to contact the Woodzie community at large.
Conga line.
Would it be fun if people voted on the best pot luck food contribution? We could give an award to the winner.
Pony rides.
Make a comment with your ideas!
8 comments:
#1 Suggestion is that Leslie puts your lovely art back in the header. As a matter of fact, I believe it should be in the by-laws that only your art goes in the header.
OK. I'll change it. :)
I loved the art area, that's something we have to continue and expand next year. That was maybe the biggest success this year. There was all this energy in the air so when kids walked up on the tables of art supplies their eyes got wide and they started to clap and laugh... they were in heaven. For those who aren't doing music, art as a similar way to express themselves just fit into the scene perfectly. And it needs to be under that same leaning tree; that spot was as beautiful as anything at the Woodzie.
That's my first addition to the list. BUT it has dawned on me that to go along with the list we need to put specific volunteers in charge of each specific thing. Soon enough in advance so they can be prepared.
I say "we" and when I do, look out. My friends have spent years watching my same mistakes occur and reoccur and one of them is thinking "WE are going to do such and such". "We" are going to do such and such almost always means nobody is going to do such and such. I can't even get "I am" to happen about 80% of the time, we is way out there in dreamland. We means I can't do it and I don't have a freakin' clue who is.
Mike Fletcher turned me onto this saying: the difference between a dream and a plan is a date. "I'm going to do this but I can't say when" is a dream "I'm going to do this Friday at noon" is a plan. Substitute I can't say when with I can't say who and that's a failure in my plan making process. I do have the ability to visualize a thing and I can get people heading in the same general direction towards a group accomplishment but there's always a wild and woolly stretch of pure chaos in the middle. :)
My new Woodzie mantra is "The difference between a dream and a plan is a person in charge".
Think of the things that work each year: Chris is the PIC of sound. Jimmie is PIC of the art. For the cowboy breakfast Kim is the PIC. For the t-shirts it's Taylor. We need to come up with the official list of the critical things and have someone's commitment to either get to the West Indies or go down with the ship on that project.
For one thing, someone coming out and checking the wiring and having it working perfectly a week before needs to be on that list.
Someone in charge of setting up some interesting and effective way to light the stage. Coleman lanterns were cool except they shone back in the audience's eyes.
A system of colored cans or signs to have an organized trash and recycling thing, and where the containers actually leave here on the day after the Woodzie.
I dunnoooooo, it was kind of perfect!! that's the feeling I got from everybody there.
I sure hope "The WODDZIEs" didn't leave a mess. I saw the garbage pail that had a "recycling" sign attached to it and everybody was using it but it got full really quick and we didn't know where to take that bag or how to get another one. I guess that's what you mean.
What we used to do in the country was to throw all food and paper on the fire and then there was nothing but cans to go into the trash bags. The messy garbage like food will burn. You don't want to burn toxic things but anything to do with paper plates and the food on them is not toxic and burns down to ashes. In many ways that is better than going to a landfill.
Everybody did a wonderful job of not leaving a mess. Thank you, thank you. People didn't make such as huge mess to start with and then people got up early Sunday morning and just started picking up, it was extremely cool. Thanks so much to everybody who did that. When Jimmie and I stepped out of our tent at 8:30, I was expecting to see the floor of the Cadillac Bar after the Tejas party. I almost didn't want to look. But in fact it was very Smokey The Bear clean. The Indian wasn't standing on the ridge with a tear in his eye. It was a happy moment. What a great bunch of Woodzie people.
But the item for the list that needs to be improved is that after the clean up what we're left with is about 20 big bags of mixed trash that we have to find a way to get rid of. I agree that burning would reduce that to 4 or 5 bags. Wet food scraps are the bummer and that bonfire will turn chicken bones and every kind of leftover to ash. When it's all mixed together in plastic bags and left we're likely to have the raccoons go wild. Have you seen the ads for those videos "Raccoons Gone Wild"?
Maybe you're right, maybe what fixes this problem is to have everybody walk their paper plates over to the fire and burn food leftovers and paper and just have a plastic and a can container and have a volunteer with a pickup truck drop those containers at the recycling depot.
That would be an awesome weight off us in the aftermath of the Woodzie.
John, just some advice on that, when the method people see is stuff going on the fire then kids - good kids who just aren't experienced yet - and the inevitable percentage of adult dumb asses will be pitching everything in the fire. Glass, smelly plastic burning forks and it'll mess up the beautiful bonfire plus some glass could explode.
good discussion on a difficult problem. You know most events ask that glass not even come in. Besides the fire glass just isn't good.
Yeah, know what's the second worst thing about glass after that it's sharp? It's the heaviest of trash.
Some things have to come in glass (medicinal Tequila) but how about asking people to limit glass AND for them to take their glass back home with them.
Cans are no problem, like this year the hard core hippies picked them all up to sell. :)
I think our problem is glass and wet garbage.
Who knows anything about this kind of thing. Somebody out there has to have some experience with how to handle this problem. Speak up!
You know, I did think about this ahead of time - I just didn't have any time to work on a solution. I'll try much harder next year. I would think that anyone who lives where there is curbside recycling could be encouraged to take their glass back with them.
Random ideas:
Rather than the "solo" cups for beer and drinks - souvenir cups
Contact a recycling center to see if they provide containers for events
Compost bin - useful and educational
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