So, this trip snuck up on me very quickly. I raced in South Dakota on Sunday and flew out of Denver on Monday evening. I was actually in 5 different states in 2 days! Crazy.....Nebraska, South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, and Nevada. I have never been to Vegas or anywhere close to experiencing anything quite like it.
As some of you may know, we are working very diligently to achieve the next level of food certification through a standard called the BRC (British Retail Consortium) Issue 6. This will open us up to trade with more customers. I have been working on this since I was put in charge of the safety stuff. As I was digging deeper and deeper into it with my crew and with Les Dale, our food safety consultant, I realized the need for more information and training.
Several weeks ago, I did alot of random internet searches to find just the right class that would allow me to network with other processors as well as learn how to use the standard to prepare for our upcoming audit. I found just the class located in Denver, not too far away. When I contacted them about the class, it had been canceled due to lack of participation....so I looked into Dallas and Nashville....also canceled. So, what does that leave...Las Vegas. Now most of you may think, "Oh, that is great, what an awesome vacation and place to have a conference." I'd like to disagree with you right now.
This country girl was totally not prepared for Vegas. When I arrived I had a shuttle all lined up that would take me directly to my hotel upon my arrival. The driver kindly grabbed my bag and asked where I needed to go. I proceeded to tell him, "The Tropicana hotel." I was his first stop of the trip. I got out and the first thing I noticed as I walked in was all the crazy lights and games and people everywhere! I must have looked ridiculous! I just stood there and took it all in. (P.S. I still had my pants tucked into my boots from the strip search at the airport! They made me mail my pink pocket knife home with 3-4 weeks delivery, so we were off to a great start! My knife would have been fine in my checked bag accept the fact that they wanted $20 to check my bag and then couldn't guarantee that my bag would make it from Denver to Vegas with me. Seriously?!) This very nice woman, running one of the card games, gently nudged me in the right direction to the check-in area. I stood in line for about 15 minutes until it was my turn. Turns out I was not a registered guest at this hotel and there are actually two Tropicana hotels....mine was the Hampton Inn at Tropicana. Who would have known!? LOL!
I had two options: 1.5 mile walk with a suitcase/in cowboy boots, in downtown Vegas or public transportation. At this point I almost broke down. It was 100* and blowing dust, I had just run a half marathon the day before, and quite honestly I was scared to take the public transportation. The bell hop could see my concern and offered for me to go inside and get the phone number of the free shuttle from my real hotel to where I was standing. He said that it comes a couple times per hour and he hadn't seen it in a while so it would probably be there shortly. I went back inside and stood in line again, once again, when I heard, "Ma'am, ma'am....your shuttle is here!" Music to my ears. I was taken on a very quiet little shuttle with only one other person on it straight to my hotel doorstep. I even got to talk to the driver about my Strip at Night 1/2 Marathon I'm running there in December. He was super nice! Actually everyone there was nice as far as people that work there!
Once I got checked in, I went to my hotel room and stayed...all night! I closed the curtains in the room and didn't even look outside! Turns out the hotel didn't have any food other than breakfast in the morning so I could either go walk the strip and eat at a restaurant or order food in the room. I definitely wasn't going out by myself in Vegas and order in food was really expensive so I decided to just eat trail mix I had in my suitcase. Well about 10:30 pm I couldn't wait any longer and I broke down and ordered food to the room. It turned out to be pretty good.
My class started the next morning at 8 am, right there in my hotel, thank goodness! I went to the fitness center before class and happened to meet one of the three other people involved in my class. He was from Case Chicken Farms in Ohio. Our instructor was from Texas and the other two people were from Florida and North Carolina. We represented a very diverse group as we had a chicken slaughter facility, dry edible beans, and an actual auditor.
Let's just say that everyone in the class had been through several audits before and so they all helped me out tremendously by giving me examples and making the Standard become a reality to me. At first it was just a book that had lots of rules in it, but now, after networking with my classmates, I am able to find my way through it and work on implementing it here in our facilities. It was extremely beneficial for me to attend this class as now, if I passed the test, I will be considered BRC certified. This just allows us to let our customers know that we are working towards this lofty goal of achieving BRC status which is globally recognized for food safety.
After class, our instructor had a car and offered to take us out to eat and for a drive on the strip. This was the perfect amount of "going out" for me. I could see from a distance all the happenings in Vegas, but felt safe as I was not driving or taking public transportation. We ate at the Hard Rock Cafe. Very good. They even gave me a free poker chip which was requested by a friend of mine's son! Perfect!
Day Two of the class continued to cover the depth of the Standard and we actually walked through how a real audit would go. It was great! We finished up with a 50 question multiple choice test which will be used to show our completion and certification of taking the class.
I was finally able to relax by the pool a little bit the last night. It was totally needed and I was happy to be surrounded by palm trees within a gated area where I could not see any of the craziness that was going on outside. :)
Moral of this story is don't go to Vegas alone!
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