Doesn't Hurt to Ask

A little over a month ago, I was eating dinner at Mason's Restaurant in Minneapolis where I enjoyed one of their fabulous mojitos. I blogged about it here. In the weeks since, I have tried to make my own mojito at home... key word: tried. But instead of continuing to waste expensive liquor and limes, I decided to email Mason's Restaurant. I praised their awesome food and fabulous mojitos, provided a link to my blog post proving just how awesome I think they are, and then very politely asked if they would consider giving me their mojito recipe.
I waited. And waited. And waited. I figured it was probably a dumb idea to ask a restaurant for a recipe and knew they would be WAY too busy to reply to my little email request. And yet, what did I have to lose? The worst that could happen would be a "no" or a "no reply."
But guess what? I got an email last week with the recipe! I was having one of those crappy days at work and was absolutely elated to find that email in my inbox when I got home. Simply head-over-heels-happiness. I think I even did a little happy-dance.
Lesson learned:  it doesn't hurt to ask.

Me with mojito at Mason's Restaurant.

Another case in point... I have previously blogged about my search for the Our Wisconsin magazine's key to the Kia Soul contest - here and here. Charlie and I have been diligently following the clues and map, narrowing down our search to the remaining counties. I've noticed over the past few months that Google searches for certain key words pertaining to this contest have led people to my blog.
Yesterday I received an email from a girl named Hailey on my Hiking with Heather Facebook page requesting the current information from the August/September issue of the magazine and asking if I could help her out. Imagine that... a fifteen-year-old girl willing to ask for something she needed - Hailey, you are awesome.
I happened to be in the middle of packing up hiking gear for my Saturday hike with Charlie when I saw that email, but I took a few minutes to take a picture of the magazine page for Hailey and emailed it to her so she could continue her search. (Good luck Hailey)

And later that afternoon, as I was looking for the parking area to a new hiking spot, I pulled over to the side of the road to ask a woman walking by if she could give me directions. Guess what? She knew what I was looking for and was helpful in pointing me in the right direction. Instead of wasting time looking for my destination, I asked for help and was able to get out on the trail quicker than if I'd continued aimlessly driving around.
It doesn't hurt to ask.
By the way, if you haven't already "Liked" my Facebook page, why not click this link and do it now? ...doesn't hurt to ask, right?!