Food

I've been working on the agenda for the conference call to be held Sunday evening. Here's a version of that agenda that has been heavily edited. (The actual agenda has much, much more detail including names associated with each assignment where possible, additional status details, etc.)

BUDDIPOLE USERS ON MONTSERRAT
"Not rare, but well done!"

AGENDA for January 7, 2007 Conference Call
(Just 21 days to go)

*** QUICK STATUS UPDATE ***

[a] QSL card printing estimates
[b] QSLing
[c] Equipment Coordinator (EC) found!
[d] Pilot and backup Webmaster
[e] George Briggs (K2DM) email review

1. HOT ISSUES
{List of stuff that's late, basically}

2. VOLUNTEERS SOUGHT:
[a] CFO
[b] Motor pool
[c] Food chairman

3. Open issues
* Equipment inventory and packing (moves to HOT after this meeting!)
* Looking for CFO volunteer.
* Looking for Motor Pool volunteer.
* Looking for Food chairman.
* Paper logging format. Group review. Archiving?
* The volcano.

4. Leader reports
Please be prepared to give a very brief status.
[a] Webmaster
[b] Online logging
[c] QSL card design
[d] QSL manager
[e] Propagation guru
[f] CFO
[g] Activities coordinator
[h] Motor pool
[i] Food chairman

5. Equipment and operating discussion
[a] Discussion of individual on-air goals for the trip.
[b] Review of everybody's equipment spreadsheets.
[c] Identification of missing items.
[d] Initial baggage allocation discussion.

The Food Chairman position is somewhat new. I've only broached the topic once before with a couple of the guys. Here's the idea: It seems to me that there are several really good reasons to do some meal planning. There are seven of us, and we're going to be really busy. If you're on vacation with your wife and you take 3 hours to decide where to have dinner and actually eat, that's fine. That's not appropriate for this trip, IMHO.
We could have dinner brought in (catered) for, say, 5 of the 7 nights we're there. After a long day of hiking, surfing, diving, operating, and otherwise running around the island, the group would rendezvous back at the villa and have a meal together about 7 PM. Somebody brings in a big container of pasta, or chicken, or something with all the trimmings. They cook, we eat, they clean up (or the disposable containers get tossed). Easy, fast, good eating. Then back to the radios!
We could have stuff around for both breakfast and lunch around: fruit, cereal, salad stuff, bread, peanut butter/jelly (I'm still a sucker for PBJs), cold cuts, etc. If you were going to take a hike to a hilltop, pack a lunch. Up all night working Asia and Europe? Fix yourself some cereal or make a sandwich, even a midnight snack.
A couple of team members are vegetarians. Planning ahead will also help accommodate that, too. This doesn't need to be complicated. We just need a meal plan something like:

• Monday = steak tips, rice, corn, salad + veggie dish
• Tuesday = Spaghetti, bread, salad
• Wednesday = hamburgers + vegge dish + fruit salad
• Thursday = chicken & rice, beans, salad + vegge dish

Then add the big grocery list for breakfast/lunch stuff like:

• milk, orange juice, cranberry juice, diet coke
• bread, peanut butter, jelly, ham, swiss cheese, mayo, etc.
• lettuce, salad dressings, croutons, carrots, onions, etc.
• cereals, fruit, granola bars
• cookies, chips, other snacks
• good stuff for packing a lunch for hikers and travelers

I'd like to really get a plan together on this so we just get the supplies we need when on the island, have somebody else do most of the cooking (and clean up), and generally know that I'll be fed and not spend a lot of time arranging to be fed. Time will be precious there; I don't want to be spending it worried about "what's for dinner?" I want to run QSOs on 20m.
This seems like a good idea to me, but we'll discuss it within the group. Time is precious on the island so I'd love to have this part settled in advance. Then again, most people like to be extemporaneous when they travel, exploring new places, eating at new restaurants, especially the one they just heard about! My approach puts a damper on that stuff. I guess everything is a trade-off. That's another great reason to have the conversations now rather than while on the island!