Scheduling - The Chicken or the Egg - Part 1

One of the major bug a boos of an Eastern Star year is the calendar. As I have mentioned, I have already started putting together a general idea of how mine will look, but currently, I am painting with a broad brush, just getting the overall feel of what I want to do and how. There are a number of different views on how the calendar should be put together and some of them are mutually exclusive. Each seems to have its good points and its bad points, but at the end of the day, you do the best you can and pray for good weather. One of the topics that has been floating around for me is the question of OVs and Receptions. In some years, all of the Official Visits start in January and end around June or July. Then all the Receptions fall in, starting with the Grand Conductress in July, before the legislative booklet comes out and announces her nominee for her, and then all of the appointive officers and the Grand Treasurer, presuming that she or he will only serve one year, which is what has been happening lately, and ending in September with a joint reception for the WGM and WGP. There used to be separate receptions for those two, with his first and hers after, but time, cost, convenience and travel have encouraged the joint reception for our leaders, assuming that by the end of the year, you and your guy are still on good speaking term. :-) I had considered splitting those two back apart, simply because it is nice to have your reception close to family and friends so that those who have done all the work of supporting you can attend with minimal trouble, but the 2013 calendar has conspired against me on that and forced a decision to have a joint reception because there's only on Saturday in September to have it. So Mr. Wizard and I will not have to discuss the pros and cons on that topic, since the calendar has decided it. For people who do all the receptions at the end of the year, the philosophy is that receptions should fall closer to the end of a person's term of service. After all, we are honoring the service they've given rather than the service they are going to do, some say. And it is nice to get the OVs done earlier so that all the Deputies can breathe a little easier. The other advantage here is that the Chapter giving the reception has more time to plan it and put it together. However, another way of doing the OVs and Receptions is to spread both out over more of the calendar. Receptions can start as early as March or April and are spread throughout the year. In this model, the OVs can go later, even into July and August also. But it also means that some people have very early receptions and their Chapters have less time to plan and prepare. The advantage of spreading the receptions out is that the Grand Family doesn't attend two and three receptions each weekend and it is less hardship for all of the Grand Family to attend each one without missing because they don't have to race off to get ready for their own. It also allows more receptions to be placed on Saturday nights, which seems to be the time that gets the most attendees and if you are going to put on a reception, it would seem to be nice to get as many people to attend as possible. And it also allows for a slightly easier travel schedule if your Grand Officers are very spread out because if you have three receptions in a weekend, you have to travel to each one. So I am wrassling with these two different views and trying to decide between them as I look at the basics of charting out a calendar. However, this is the macro view. The problems of the micro view are a topic for next week. This weekend I will be home for New Year's.