I have to share a funny story that happened to me recently while working on a course here at the School of Government. I was assigned a course that needed a location for the spring. With some direction from the faculty member in charge, I was off and running.
After a few days of researching, I put together my best proposals and photos and sent them over to the faculty member. I included a number of different locations in and around the targeted city. These proposals included local colleges, city space, and private business space.
After a brief review, the faculty member sent me a link to a city location and asked me to look into this place. It was a city location that I thought I had already sent as an option. Still, the link was different and I clicked on it. I was taken to a different site than I had previously visited. "How could I have missed this?" I thought. The price on this space was much better too. I thought it would be best to investigate this further, so I looked for contact information to give them a call. That's when I notice a strange phone number. It was 2 digits then 4 digits then another 4 digits. Because of my previous work with international clients, I instantly recognized that this was an international phone number.
I re-checked the URL. It had a .au address. This meant I was looking at a city in Australia. Then I pulled up Google maps to confirm further. Yes, in fact, it was a city on the West Coast of Australia.
I chuckled.
I'm sure that my faculty member didn't even realize this when she sent it to me, so I wrote her a quick note. "The site you sent me is for a city in Australia. I believe I already sent you this city in North Carolina."
Her response, "Ooooops! A bit of a commute." I knew she was probably laughing at this too.
She was so eager to cover her bases that she made an innocent mistake in her research. Sometimes, you just need to leave it to the professional. :-) Trust me... I do this for a living! Ha-ha!