See what had happened was....

This post is for all of my Facebook friends wondering what I was talking about when I posted "Only me, so embarrassed..." yesterday. I am the Director of Public Relations for Philadelphia Public Schools. We have an annual event called "Meet the Tornadoes". We introduce the football team, band, cheerleaders, and any other fall sports team to the community. It is a big event and we always have a huge turnout. We are are a small town but we play BIG sports!

Normally we use things like "A storm is brewing over Harpole Stadium" or "It's getting cloudy, looks like the Tornadoes are going to Roll tonight" to promote such events. Almost every year it storms on Meet the Tornadoes night, and almost every year we have to cancel and reschedule. Which I find totally ironic considering we are the Tornadoes and have to reschedule due to storms.

We have an alert call system that notifies parents, students, teachers, faculty, and staff of things like events, cancellations, meetings, changes, and even an encouraging word from the principals the night before testing begins. I am responsible for this system. I record all of the calls so that they are consistent. I normally do them from my office or home computer. Even if there is an emergency call out I calmly go to my computer log in, enter all the info, then read the message I was instructed to send out. I can preview it before I send, which I always do! I had only used the call in method one other time about a year ago, but I was at home and it was quiet and calm.

I had gone with Chad, Derek (Tech Guy at Philly), Nathan (Tech Guy at Philly), and my boys to eat supper before going back to the school to wait on Meet the Tornadoes to start at 9:00. We live about 30 minutes from the school so when we have an event we are there for the duration! While there my boss Dr. Larabee called me to tell me to be on stand-by, they would be meeting and making a decision shortly. I told him no problem. I have a card in my wallet with a 1-800 number that you can call to do an alert call from your phone. You just dial, enter a pass code, a pin, and record your message. Sounds simple huh?

           www.advocare.com/120427588

A few minutes later the bottom fell out, terrible lightning, thunder and gushing water falling from the sky. We were in Popeye's and they had their Cajun creole music blaring. Side note: I went to Hardee's to get a turkey burger on whole
grain bun, on day 12 of my AdvoCare 24 day challenge and Popeyes is not on the list. People were everywhere running in to get out to the rain. About that time Dr. Larabee called me and directed me to do an alert call that said "Meet the Tornadoes has been cancelled" and so on. I told you in my previous post I make a list for a list, I am a planner and I certainly strive to be proficient and professional no matter what I am doing. So I typed the message into Chad's phone on notes since I couldn't hear well enough to type them on my on phone. When I hung up the phone with Dr. Larabee Chad and the tech guys decided they needed to go on back to the school to shut the press box and score board down for the night due to the cancellation. Chad grabbed his phone and headed out. We all paused to say good-bye to my Sister-in-law/BFF, Chastity, Brother-in-law Steven, and niece Hailey Brooke before we left. In the mean time I dialed the 1-800 number and started entering the codes. We were walking out and I was on step 3, you know the part where it says "After the beep record your message, when you are finished recording your message hit the # sign". It dawned on me Chad couldn't leave with his phone, I needed it to read the message and record it correctly. So as we were walking out the door in the torrential weather I said the following now famous words that will go into Philadelphia Public School District forever, "I need your phone to do the message I typed it on there." About that time I hung up, thinking that I had not entered anything so I could just call the system back and record the correct message in the privacy and quiet of my vehicle.

I proceeded to my car, jumped in, threw my stuff down and began dialing. I went through my whole process then right when I began to record the correct message about the cancellation I heard a ding. Not just any ding, it was the one I had set to ding when I receive Alert Calls from the school on my phone. (I realize I send them out but that is one way I can ensure they are sent.) My heart sank. I immediately knew what I had done. I had sent a message, not a message I had reviewed. Really at that point, had no idea what all I had sent to each and every person on the Philadelphia Public School District call out list, which might as well be Neshoba County and the surrounding areas. Every teacher, faculty member, administrator, parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle on the list.

After I reviewed my correct message I told it to send, and flipped over to my voicemail. At that point I figured maybe no one would notice if it followed with the correct one, maybe they would miss it. Once a call gets sent, there is no stopping it. Not even the President himself could stop it. It's immediate. Believe me, if there had been a way to stop it this girl would have done it and danced in the rain after! Chad's phone that was in my hand had like 10 texts, and two or three people called him. My phone was ringing, dinging, singing. You name it. I knew that EVERYONE had heard it!

I pressed the little play button, my heart was racing 90 miles an hour. There it was, in all it's glory. "I need your phone to do the message, I typed it on there." Then my heart skipped a beat, or two when the little lady came on to say "To hear this message again press 1." I was scared that it was still me talking. You must understand that when I record these messages I give 110%. This means yes, sometimes they are obnoxiously perky and chipper with lots of enthusiasm, and a little sweetness to boot. Can't help it, it's who I am. Just kidding. I mean I am but I take my job seriously and I want anyone that hears that message to want to listen and not dread getting them. This message however was far from that. It was more of Ellie-May, meets fussing wife, whiny diva not wanting to get her hair wet. I was mortified. There I sat in my car at Popeyes crying and dreading what came next. I knew I needed to post the information to the school's Facebook page, Twitter, and the website so I put off calling him a little longer and completed at least those jobs properly.

I went ahead and called Dr. Larabee, and prefaced our conversation with "Please don't fire me." At this point he had not heard it. He told me it would be okay and things happen. He just wanted to make sure the correct message got out. Then he had time to think about it, to ponder it. Anyone that knows Dr. Terry Larabee knows he loves a good story, especially good funny ones. While he was wiping his tears, picking himself up off the floor from laughing, and discussing it with our Curriculum Coordinator, Lee Ann Fulton who also had received the call, one of my favorite administrators called me, Coach Gentry. I could tell he was doing his best not to laugh but then he couldn't help it. He told me he had played it back for his wife and kids and they thought it was hilarious!  I began to laugh at that point. He told me that it was great and he needed the laugh, that it was life and things happen. Which is something he knows a lot about considering one of the stories about him I witnessed first hand, but I will save that for another day, wink wink.

A few minutes later Dr. Larabee called me back, laughing his head off. We had a pretty comical conversation and re-hashed this whole ordeal. He also told me we had to figure out a way to get it on the Athletic Banquet slideshow. and texts continued to come in, letting me know that I had sent a really interesting call out from the school. I called my friend Abby Jenkins (also our High School Middle School Counselor) looking for some support. I got it, encouragement and a lot of laughter! Someone stopped me in Wal-Mart and without me saying anything said, "Oh yeah we heard it". I figured I might as well say something on Facebook because you see I work with the Tech Team and they are part-time comedians. Well it has now gone viral, well Neshoba County viral anyway. If they didn't get the call they have heard about it. Chad also posted and the comments lasted almost to midnight, then started again this morning. Everyone had a little something to say, the Business Manager, my co-workers, teachers, the SPED/TITLE Director.

Chad apparently didn't get enough enjoyment out of it last night so he posted this picture today with the caption "I need your phone to do the message, I typed it on there."

All that being said, I told Dr. Larabee that I am thankful I have a boss and administrators that get way more enjoyment out of making fun of me than fussing at me. I am thankful that they see the humor in it and understood that mistakes happen. I am blessed to work with some of the funniest, sweetest, best people around. I love my PPSD family and I am so glad they love me!  Lesson learned: The call out system accepts whatever you say and sends it if you just hang up. It's a good thing I know you have to be able to laugh at yourself because I will never live this one down.