Five hundred million dollars? That's a lot of money. That's a lot of equipment. I wonder how long it'll take to manufacture and ship that much. Too bad, I could use the money right now to pay for the land we just bought. If we only made ten percent on the deal that's still fifty mil. That's a ton of money.
Five hundred million dollars? We just did that, or Phil did that when Sue and I were in San Francisco. That's what Mercy heard. We're doing that much again?
What am I doing dreaming about money? I don't give a shit about money. I give a shit about this babe in my arms. Hmm, there are two babes in my arms. I really give a shit about this big titted one that is carrying our baby. I need to look to see what time it is, but I don't want to open my eyes.
That did it, I looked at the clock, five-fifty. I slipped out of bed, started the coffee, came back and peed, then went to Mickey and began kissing her awake. "If you keep that up, I won't want to get up."
"Come on, sleepy head, you have roll call in an hour," I said, tugging on her arm.
She got up and, after using the throne, joined me in the shower. We enjoyed washing each other, getting the juices worked up, but not doing anything about it. She said, "You have to come to bed earlier so you and Sue can put me to sleep."
We both dressed, with me in shorts and T-shirt. Mickey and I had a cup of coffee on the patio with the light out, but the air on, before she left for work. I think she enjoyed the personal time we had together as much as I did. When she left, I primed the big pot and turned on the overhead light and the TV. I opened the sliding glass door and went into the kitchen to start a big breakfast. I made up six pounds of bacon and mixed up a bowl of six dozen eggs. I made up a big batch of biscuits and cooked them. With the crowd that would be here, I made sixty biscuits. That should be enough. I pulled the pile of boiled potatoes from the fridge and chopped them all up. Using some of the bacon grease, I began frying potatoes.
People were gathering on the patio. Glenda came in to help me cook. She always gets a kick out of me cooking and loves to help. I told her the only things left were the eggs and gravy. I didn't want to do either until most of the people were up.
I woke Sue, who also didn't want to get up. I told her I had a big glass of orange juice for her. She got up, unwillingly, but got up anyhow. I knocked on Susan's door and said it was time, then I did the same for the kids. All I heard were grumbles. Their body clocks were an hour earlier than here but it was seven here, time to get up and enjoy this fine Saturday.
Tiny was making Bloody Marys for Ryan, Phil, and several others who were a little hung over. I love Bloody Marys, so I had one too. When Susan and Kevin joined us, they wanted one as well.
Glenda and I went in to finish breakfast. I did the eggs while she did the gravy. The potatoes and bacon were warming in the oven. I always cook the bacon like that, just not quite done; that way warming it finishes cooking it without over cooking.
When we began putting platters of food on the table, they were like a bunch of vultures. I swear we could have made twice as much. Maybe the next time we would. Nelda enjoyed her breakfast, saying it was really fun to eat here in the morning.
The topic of Busch Gardens came up and I asked around for opinions. Charlie and Shawna were in, Hank and Debbie wanted to go, Hanna wanted to go, and Nelda had never been. Tiny and Ruth were in, as were Ryan and Michelle. Phil and Judy wanted to go look at boats. Go figure. I told them to look for a big schooner for me, somewhere around a hundred footer. All I got for that comment was a "Yeah, right."
We would try to go en masse so we could tour the park together. It's fun in a big group.
Sandy and Mandy were having a big conference with Drew and Bob. Drew finally said, "I don't know whether I can walk all day at the park. I'd love to go, but I may not make it."
I said, "If you get tired, would you feel bad about using a wheelchair for part of the day?"
"No, I've had to use one lots before. I have one at my place, but not here," he said.
"No problem," I said. "They have them there that we can rent when you're done in for the day. Is Bob good to go?"
Sandy said, "He's always shy about not being able to hear or speak. I keep trying to convince him that there are several of us who can talk to him."
Michelle surprised everyone by going over to Bob and signing to him quickly. You could tell she was experienced. Bob finally nodded, agreeing to go. Michelle smiled, and as she walked back to Ryan she said, "I have a deaf brother. He acts the same, I know how to handle him."
I needed to learn to sign.
The park opened at ten, so we wanted to be in line before then. We were going to leave for the park at nine. We cleaned up the patio then everyone took showers and got ready.
It took Sue and me an exceptionally long time to get through the shower and get dressed, as I became overly interested in investigating how her pussy was doing while pregnant. A lot of probing was required, along with a special cream douche.
Tom, Al, Betty, and Joan had decided to join the masses and go to the park too. Susan said, "It's amazing how many people were here last night, and all those people just vacuumed the breakfast food up in an instant. This is an amazing place."
The day at the park was a blast. We rode the rides multiple times. Sue, Shawna, and Hanna wouldn't go on the big roller coaster, but did go on the little one. They did the log flume that gets you wet and the rapids in the round raft thing. We had some free beer for lunch and made the people make at least twenty pizzas for us. The kids had a great time. They loved the animals, enjoying getting up close to a giraffe and watching the other big animals. Nelda, Glenda, and Martin all had a good time too, as they patiently waited with the pregnant girls while the wilder people went on some of the scary rides. Busch Gardens is worth the money anytime you go. They offered a deal, that people could go back for an extra day within two weeks. The offer would not go unused.
On the way home, we stopped at a Steak and Shake. Sue had been begging for one of their malted milkshakes for a couple of weeks. I love those things too. Everyone ate plenty of hamburgers and chili, along with lots of ice cream treats.
At home on the patio, at nearly ten at night, everyone was bushed. I walked Nelda home then joined the others in having a beer. Yawning pursued, so there were not many who stayed up for Saturday Night Live. Mickey said that it was strange hanging around the patio when no one was there. She asked if she could put her bike in my shed. We put it in with the other two bikes.
Charlie and Jim said they were going to the hot tub. Susan and Kevin said they were ready for bed, since it had been a long, long day.
By eleven thirty the patio was shut down, the big coffee pot was primed, and I was teasing a couple of freshly showered ladies. The teasing continued until we fell asleep.
Sunday became a day for the Lowry Park Zoo. Not as many people came with us, but there was still a bunch. Nelda was right there with us. I was worried that she might be overdoing it, but she said she was fine. The zoo is really a remarkable place to visit. They have a really big variety of animals that we looked at. Since it isn't nearly as big as Busch Gardens, we were home by two in the afternoon. At three, when Mickey came home from work, we piled into a bunch of cars and went to Clearwater beach for a couple of hours. Tiny and Ruth took Ryan and Michelle, along with Nelda. They stopped and picked up a nice swimsuit for her. She insisted on putting it on in the store then putting her shorts and shirt on over it.
At the beach, we covered everyone with lotion, especially Nelda and the folks from up north. It was four in the afternoon, but it was still bright sunshine. The kids had a great time running out into the water swimming out a little ways and letting the incoming tide wash them back in. They saw a few sting rays, but thankfully we didn't even see any nurse sharks.
We rinsed off the salt at seven and made it back to the house. On the way home, Sue ordered pizza and wings. We stopped to pick them up, along with a bunch of romaine, so I could make some salads.
The patio was in full swing. The twenty pizzas and twenty orders of wings were gone quickly. We were going to have to increase our order. Almost everyone had a salad. I was going to have to make more of the different dressings too. A big cheer went up when the Pizza Hut guy showed up with twenty more pizzas. There was very little left when we were finished.
Sue was busy with Susan and Kevin. She had them booked into Disney village, along with a five day excursion to the Disney area parks that included a day at Universal Studios and a day at Sea World. They would not be back until Friday evening.
The kids were so excited, they couldn't stand themselves. When Sue got me aside and asked if I wanted to go with them, I hoped I didn't go against her wishes when I told her no. I had far too much to do to go to Orlando for a week. We asked Nelda, but she wanted to stay around home for the week.
We finally settled down and put everyone to bed. Sue and I were cuddling alone, as Mickey said she needed to go home tonight. We enjoyed being alone with each other. Sue said she knew I needed to get some things done, but wanted to make sure I didn't want to visit with my sis.
The week went fast. Susan only called once, telling me they were having a great vacation. By Friday we had an architect's plans for the property. The first thing to do was to build the roads and run services to the planned locations of the first buildings.
We made an agreement with Perkins and signed with Holiday Inn for an Express franchise.
Wednesday, I was able to gather all of the contractor's various crews together in the big meeting room at the shop. Some were subcontractor groups and some had been his employees. I explained that I was going to act as the general contractor for the project until he was able to come home. We all understood the priority of his family over business. I was going to have to take a test somewhere, but I was determined to get this thing started. I told all of the workers that we would need them, plus many more, for this project. If I just put the job out to bid, I wouldn't get the quality I was used to getting from his crew. I wanted the building and the construction to be first class.
One of the contractor's men came up to me and introduced himself as Mark Jones. "Mr. Sharp, I have a contractor's license and would be glad to help you on your project. I'm a good worker and would prefer to work, but you can use my license to get started. This is a good hardworking crew. I'd like them to stay together. There are more of us, but a lot didn't show up because they didn't recognize who you were. I'll get them together."
"Thanks, Mark, I'll take you up on your offer, but I'll also need someone to really be the ramrod on this job. Someone who is willing to be the on site bully to make the place into a great job site."
"I'm not your man for that, but I have someone who is. He's young, he's black though, but he's good, and all the men here like him. He used to work with us and then went to college to become an architect. He's worked a couple little jobs, but he's free right now."
"Okay, Mark, get him for me. I'll bring my employment person out to the job site and get you all signed up as employees. Like I said, this is a long term project."
I thought for a minute, then said, "Get your man to me as soon as possible, and tell everyone to come to the shop in the morning. That will be better than the job site."
The Holiday Inn people had their own construction company. I was going to have someone stand over them to make sure the place was built not only to their specs, but to my standards.
Thursday morning, a tall black guy came into the showroom, looking around. I introduced myself to him and told him he was probably looking for me. He introduced himself as Terrell Davis and said he had helped on the cleanup of the building and the first addition to it. He noted that it had two more additions now. He wanted to see the construction of all the additions. We walked around the building, looking at the work.
Terrell said, "I've never been able to see how your contractor could do the quality of work he does as fast as he does. He coordinates everything so tight that it's scary. But he sure does do good work."
"Terrell, I know speed is good, but I want quality more than speed. Give me a quality structure, the way I want it, and it's worth the extra time. I need you to build me a quality structure, and I also need someone to keep track of the Holiday Inn builders. I want that building to be as good as what we build. My agreement says I can direct it and have the option to accept only quality work. I need you or another qualified man to babysit that job."
"Mr. Sharp, I don't think I can do both. I can general one project, but I can't babysit another. I'll get someone for you though. I'll be losing a worker, but he's getting old anyway. He needs this kind of project."
"Get him. Are you willing to work for me, as an employee, to get this thing done? It's going to take a few years."
"That will make it even better. I won't have to worry about budgets for me, and having to skimp on eating, while the job is going. Employee is good."
I took Terrell upstairs to Ruth and introduced him, saying, "This is the first of the new S&S Enterprises Construction division."
Ruth chuckled, saying that I better tell Tiny I started another company. I told Ruth that up to a hundred men would possibly be coming in today to sign up, and that she should call in her extra help as it could get busy. She said to have them wait in the cafeteria and she would take care of them there.
I talked to our blind receptionist and told her to direct any of the construction people who came in to sign up to wait in the cafeteria, and that Ruth would be with them soon. Two guys were standing there, so I let the receptionist give them directions to the cafeteria. I didn't know where it was. I followed them to see what it looked like.
This was the big lunchroom we had built, but it now had a kitchen with a serving line in front of it. The steam tables had some nice looking food on them. I'll have to eat here to see how the food is.
One of the cooks recognized me, saying he used to work as a welder but always wanted to be a cook. He thanked me for the opportunity. I asked him if we served enough food to justify the four people I saw back there. He said they did a good business because they served most of the four hundred people from across the street too. He said there were four shifts for the lunch crowd. He said his average was about four hundred meals a day for lunch. He said there was a continuous flow throughout the day for breaks. He tried to have some healthy snacks for people.
I wonder whose idea this was. This was really good.
When I went back up to Ruth's office, I casually asked, "How many people work for S&S now, not including the new men in construction?"
Ruth looked at her sheets, and ran her finger down a list, "Two hundred twenty-seven. We have over fifty men in the field though, so we don't get to see that many."
That's scary, over two hundred people depended on me to make a good decision, whoa.
I walked across the street after seeing the Mustang parked there. I walked up to Betty's office to ask her the same question, but the place was now all rearranged. Mike's office was first. He looked up from some papers and waved. Sue, Betty, and Joan were in the old president's office pointing at patterns. Farther down was a large room with cubicles. The front of the room had an office with a glass wall. Betty was inside the glass office.
I walked in and said, "Being an exhibitionist now?"
She giggled, "No, that's the way I want it. I want to be able to see my people and I want them to be able to see me. We're moving a lot of paper now that Sue has taken over. The billing and accounts payable departments are busy all the time. Betty and Joan are constantly bringing in new designs that we are incorporating into production. This place is jumping."
"Do you still handle payroll and hiring?"
"Heavens no, Miss Hannah helps them when they are hiring a lot of people, but June is in the office across the hall. She's in charge of personnel.
The door was open, so I knocked on the jamb. "Hi, my name is Steve Sharp, Sue's husband, I have a question."
"Hi, Mr. Sharp, what is your question?" she said as she stood up.
"Sit, please. How many people work here now? I know it's around four hundred, but if it's possible I want to find out."
"Oh, that's easy." She typed in some characters on her keyboard then looked up, "As of right this minute, including Mrs. Sharp, there are five hundred seventeen. The good thing today is that we had another day without one person calling in absent. We might make an entire week with a full deck. We are hiring again next week for the last two new production rooms. That could be another hundred, so I hope we can find enough people."
"Thank you, June, you've been a big help."
Over seven hundred people depended on Sue and me. This had been an eye opener today. I wondered if Sue knew the magnitude of her employees.
I passed by where Sue had been and she was gone. Betty looked up and smiled saying, "Sue went home. She's probably getting ready for lunch."
Back across the street, Terrell was downstairs in the shop showroom with a couple of men. I asked the men to wait a second, and took Terrell upstairs to meet Tiny. Tiny said they had already met and were going to work on the site plans after lunch. Okay, they were ahead of me.
On the way back downstairs I asked if he had his general license. He did, so we wouldn't need Mark's. I asked him if Tiny and he had worked out a suitable salary and he smiled, saying he was happy. I shook his hand and said, "Go get 'em, it's your baby."
I guess Tiny was serious about making this happen. As I drove home I noticed a bulldozer at the site where the Perkins was going to be built, and another across the street where the Holiday Inn was going to be built.
Nelda and Glenda were serving Sue and Hanna soup as I came into the patio. I walked over to grab a bottle of water then sat down, taking a sandwich from the tray. Looking at Hanna, I mentioned, "I heard you're going to try to hire another hundred people for the last two production rooms."
Hanna just paused and said, "I will get them hired. We have a training program that a lot of people want to get in on. With buses now stopping right in front of the building, it's easier to get people. We have six buses at night picking up people and taking them to transfer points. We're a pretty popular employer."
"I wonder whose idea it was to make a bigger cafeteria with a kitchen and open it to both sides of the street." I just threw that out there, wondering who would reply.
"That was my idea," Glenda said. "With all those people out there, you don't want them driving off for lunch. That would be a mess. You needed to keep them right there. You had the room in your building so we just made the cafeteria bigger and let that nice John be the cook he always wanted to be. Did you know he had taken a course in food service? He's really good. Don't you think it's working out pretty good?"
"Glenda, you're a genius. I think it was a great idea."
Sue looked up from her soup and said, "Is the food good? Is it cheap enough for my people, they can't afford a lot?"
Glenda answered quickly, "I told John that he had to serve a lunch for around two dollars max. I've looked and he usually has something for around a dollar and a half. Everyone that wants to can eat. He even has the register person take employee numbers if they don't have any money. They just take it out of their pay."
Sue commented, "That's a good idea. Glad you thought of that, Glenda. See, Honey, we need to go on vacation more often. Look at all the mischief these people have gotten into."
I was shaking my head, "I know, buying out companies, buying big chunks of land, hiring seven hundred people. That's a village, for crying out loud. That's scary to know that over seven hundred people depend on us."
Nelda reached across and patted my hand, "You should think of it another way, Steve. Those seven hundred people depend on each other to keep the businesses going. You're just there to be their cheerleader."
She did make me smile. "I know I shouldn't ask this, Nelda, but how old are you anyway? I figure you for around seventy, maybe."
"No, Honey, I'll be eight-six next week. You can help me blow out my candles," the sweet little old lady said.
"I'll be sure to do that. Glenda, make sure we have a big enough cake and a lot of ice cream. We'll make it a great birthday."
"It's already a great birthday, I don't have to live on egg money anymore, I have lots of good food, lots of good friends, and I have one of my dreams. I have a home in this park. I have it all now. I'm better off at this minute than I have been for the last eighty years. Now, all I have to do is find me another man. Wonder if that can be done at my age?"
Hanna, Sue, and I were chuckling, thinking about Nelda chasing some old guy down. Glenda was the corker though, "You leave my Martin alone. I use him up all the time. I don't think he could handle another woman."
"Well, I hope I can find one as spunky as Martin, but I want one of my own. I'll find him; I just haven't been looking yet."
Sue and I went to the gym then came back to go to the pool where Glenda and Nelda were sunbathing. Nelda was getting some use from her new swimsuit. She was active enough; I hoped she did find someone.
When we were done sunbathing, Sue and I swam hard till we were winded. Sue had slowed down quite a bit, but still chugged along. She was very happy and very loving.
On the way back to the house, Sue said, "Our people are taking over. It's really great. I think when we take your family home, we should take another short vacation. Let's fly up into Canada, perhaps over to Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland, or New Brunswick. If we were really adventurous, we could fly up to Hudson Bay while it is still sort of warm."
"You know what? That's a great idea. We'll take off for a week or so and see some sights. We'll have to see where we end up."