Back to the arena

The past couple of month's it's felt like I've been out of a job. The VanAndel Arena's pretty quiet in the summer months. No, I don't get a paycheck from there per se. I work as a volunteer to raise funds for my JDRF ride. I couldn't count on my fingers and toes how many times I worked in the past 12 months, lots. But it's certainly made my fund raising a breeze this year. The group receives a % of the sales, based on what we receive and the number of hours worked we come up with an hourly rate. It usually works out to be about $10 - $12 / hr. Personally I've raised about $2,000 that way to support my JDRF ride. And when I bring friends all their hours go into my bucket, so I can double or triple my earnings when I have a buddy or two with me.
Next Friday night is the Def Leppard concert and I'm sure it'll be a challenge. Getting a booth ready is easy when there's only a couple days between events. However, when the place has been shut down for a few weeks there's much more to do. Despite that I enjoy working there. It's really not so much like work usually. The group is all friends, we're friends with the official workers and there's really not much pressure. Afterall, what are they going to do? Fire us if we do something wrong? So we usually have a good time. One thing I've enjoyed is catching a taste of some of the events that I'd never usually get to see. I saw some Van Halen and Police when they were in town. The arena gave us some free hockey tickets once & I got to spend an great evening with my middle son there. We get to interact with . . . interesting people sometimes. I'll never forget the Christmas Pimp hat guy. Most customers are fine, some are great and some are obnoxious.
Def Leppard should be fun. I'm looking forward to hearing them.