You see, Maria and Rita had bid on a job that involvedhelping to stabilize a fledgling company and get it up and runningsmoothly.  That in itself would not have been a problem for the veterantrouble shooters, but this time the behind the scenes owner of this businesswas trouble with a capital T.  They weren't aware of his involvement untiltoo late and they were already committed to the job.  Brandon Cartwrightwas the nasty man's name and he was known for expecting 110% from the peoplethat worked for him.  I f his high expectations weren't met, whoever borethe brunt of his anger never worked  in this town again.

The plan that Maria and Rita had hatched to put thiscompany solidly on its feet was intense marketing and promotion of its greatservices and abilities.  In a mid-sized community like theirs it would bea perfect opportunity to use promotional pens to do the job for them. They knew that promotional pens were a great bargain for the price.  Notonly could these pens be inscripted with various sayings and slogans, they wereeasy to get into circulation and they knew that everyone would use them. It was the perfect solution for their situation!  But Rita had not calledMaria and she was overdue to hear something by two hours.  Rita had saidthat she had a connection that would get them hundreds of promotional pens fora fraction of what they would spend on other marketing tactics.  Whyhadn't Maria heard something?

Finally the phone rang!  Maria answered it before thesecond ring and it was Rita with good news.  She had made the promotionalpens purchase and had ordered them with 10 different sayings on them that shefelt sure would convince the public that they had a wonderful company to dealwith.  She had gotten them for a good price and they would be arriving injust three days!  This was the best news of all since Brandon Cartwrighthad given them one week to come up with a plan and to get it underway. This was going to give them just the right amount of time and they knew thatthe idea of the promotional pens was a surefire strategy to help this companytake off in a profitable direction in no time.

When Maria hung up the phone, she breathed an audible sighof enormous relief.  They had done it again.  This time the stakeshad been a lot higher, but with the promotional pens doing a great job ofselling the company to the potential consumers, she knew that she and Ritawould come out smelling like roses.  And she loved roses.