A Year of Change

The first day of December. Christmas, New Year’s and a bunch of birthdays. Also the end of 2020, thank God. Let’s hope 2021 is better but there’s no guarantee to that. In fact, it could be worse. I know, bite your tongue. All we can do is take it one day at a time and keep plugging along.

Yesterday I had a good morning bird hunting. Shot about 15 pheasants in total. Lots of birds. I was so tired when I made it home that everything hurt. I slept until about 5:30 this morning. My truck made it to Denver at a cost of $455. Nice. Hopefully they’ll figure it out today and then I just need to figure out how to get down there to get it. Lori is in Vail today and Frisco tomorrow. Jag has lots of finals coming up and so does Ty. I too have a lot of work.

Haven’t even thought about Christmas shopping or anything of that sort. Not sure when we’ll get to that. Special thanks to Tom for running up to the tire shop and getting Lori’s four tires until I can get my truck and pick them up. Super pissed off about my truck. Shouldn’t happen with new cars nowadays.

Dogs are in and fed. Hope my truck is done today. Not sure how to get down there to pick it up. I’ll figure it out, GB.

Well yesterday started out with my truck not starting. Then it pretty much went downhill from there. After plugging it in and hooking up a charger I found out it has a bad battery. It’s going to have to go to Denver today. I’m so pissed. I need to pick up Lori’s summer tires in Lakewood and need to get someone to run up to Colfax and Kipling. Lori said she can call one of her friends as I was going to pick them up in my truck today but it’s now I don’t have it, nice.

On top of this, I need to leave at 4:15am to go meet a guy at 6:30 in Parker and pick up a few thousand dollars to get it into the bank before he leaves for South Dakota. I’ll have to take Lori’s car. Hopefully by the time I’m done, my truck is on the way to the dealer.

Ty has six school days left in the year and Jag is studying hard for finals too. His car will have to wait to get fixed until we get some things handled.

Yesterday we hung out but it was not a good day as the truck breaking set everything else off. Lucky Annette wasn’t around! Time to go as I need to go. They say snow in a day or two. It’ll probably come right about when my truck is fixed. Then I just need to get a ride down to Denver to get it. Oh well, today is a new day, and it has to be better, God Bless.

Lori. Ty and I made it down to Denver ok and had the tires installed and their hair done. We made it up by mid-afternoon after stopping at Tommy’s and loading up on freshly baked Christmas cookies. We saw Tom and Ali for a bit but didn’t stay too long. Tommy gave Lori a pretty star she set on the counter by family photos which lit up and added to the holiday feeling.

Jag was home with the dogs and when we arrived home he had the music blasting from our bedroom as he was taking a steam shower. Life is good, like a spa, ha.

Around 7:30, 4 girls, Rachel, Hannah, Belle and one whose name I forget, all showed up. Jag opened the door and they all yelled something fun. A bit later Carson and another guy showed up. Man are four 18 or 19 year old girls loud! We heard them laughing and giggling all night long. I woke up at 12:30 am and Lori was out in the kitchen so everyone had gone. They had fun and yes they were all recently tested as they came home from school a week ago. But who knows, right? I stayed away from everyone and after saying my hellos, headed for my bedroom.

Today the Bronco’s play and we won’t have a quarterback! The NFL ruled all three of ours out even though they tested negative as they were at practice and one guy who tested positive. Now the NFL moved a few other games two or three times when one qb was positive but they were better teams. You see the NFL has never been a fair organization. Talk about a double standard. I think they expected us to forfeit but we didn’t, ha. Good for us. CU won too, whoo hoo!

Next up, Happy Birthday Annette! Big day today, party party, we wish you the best!

It’s 6 am now and everyone is still sleeping. I’ll be up at 3;30 tomorrow morning to go bird hunting and then pick up Lori’s tires on the way home as they wouldn’t fit in her car. Hope everyone is well, be safe and take your vitamins, especially, C, D and Zinc, God Bless.

Ty, Lori and I are off this morning at 7:30 to get snow tires on her car and haircuts for Lori and Ty. With luck we’ll be home by 2 which is 30 minutes after the CU game starts. I’ve been waiting for a break in the weather to get her car down there for tires and this is our window.

It seems like a Sunday as yesterday seemed like Saturday. Everyone up here is fine and we just hung out for most of the day. Hard to believe next week is December. We didn’t participate in Black Friday on line or in person. It’s a weird year as we all know and nothing seems normal.

Tom’s baking Christmas cookies. He does a really good job. They remind me of Grandma’s and then Auntie Dee’s. He must be using the same recipes.

Hope everyone is well, that’s it for today as it’s 5:47 and I need to get moving, God Bless.

In the morning we went to the gym and them slowly prepared to go to Thanksgiving dinner down the hill at cousin Lee’s at 2. We were about 20 minutes late but it was just us and their family so all good. Lee made a great turkey on the Traeger which is a pellet smoker. We bbq’d some tomahawk steaks I bought at Edwards whenwe arrived. There were all kinds of sides rivaling the number at Grandma Miller’s when we were kids. When I say rivaling I mean more than normal but not anywhere near as many as at Grandma’s or nearly as good. I just ate turkey, steak and salad though. We stayed until around 5;30. It was fun for all of us to be with family.

Lee seems a lot older than me even though he only has three years on me. He moves slow, like you’d think a grandfather would and just had a couple surgeries with the second one being on his right eye and he still can’t see too good out of it. Margret is great and full of life and of course their boys being mid 30’s are in their prime. Then there’s little Theo or Ted named after Uncle Ted Christian, Lee’s dad and my uncle. He brings a lot of fun and amazement as any 4 or 5 year old does. It was a really nice time.

Later in the evening Jag went out to see some friends and when coming home slid into a rock in a roundabout. He crunched the front fender on the driver side of his car. At least he wasn’t hurt. His car will need to wait to be fixed though until Mom’s estate is settled or our townhome sells. I suspect it’ll be thousands of dollars, ugh. Again though, good news is he’s ok. God Bless.

Ty was playing a video game with friends all night as I texted him at 3:30 am to go to bed. He replied quickly, “got it”.

We have an inch or snow of snow, not a lot but probably more in Vail and closer to the pass. It’s Black Friday which doesn’t mean a lot anymore. Everything is on line and honestly, we haven’t even thought about Christmas shopping. We’re just trying to get through each day. Tommy texted last night that CU is playing football today as earlier I think their game was cancelled with another team who didn’t have enough player to make up a team due to the virus. Seems like a lot more people are getting it this time around. We’re all trying to be safe.

Guess I’ll go. Hope everyone’s holiday was great. Make the best of what you have! God Bless.

After a busy day I picked Lori up in Frisco about 5:15. An hour later we were home. Jag had gone to Lexi’s and we heard him come in around 1:30 am. Ty and I tried to get on line at 7 pm to pre-order the PS5 but they were sold out before you could blink. Scalpers use computer bots (programs) to grab them all and then sell them for 2 to 3 times what they cost to kids that have to have them. We’ll wait. Hope they all lose money.

Today we’re going to Lee and Margret’s at 2 and we’ll eat around 4. It’s overcast here this morning but no new snow. Not your typical Thanksgiving but there are things to be thankful for. If you’re healthy or have a job, you should be thankful. If you have food on your table, be thankful. If you woke up! Be thankful. Things can always be worse. Still I get it, things are bittersweet. We will come through this, hang in there, shouldn’t be much longer until we turn the corner. Say a prayer, it will help.

Today starts the traditional four day weekend. I remember as a kid looking so forward to this break as after this you could count the days until Christmas. If you’re a kid, this is a magical 30 days! Now kids get the entire week off and this year, well, we all know. Lori would like to get some lights on the house today, we’ll see. Around us you can see lights popping up more and more every night.

Politically we now have Trump allowing the transition to begin for the good of the Country but there are still legal challenges. Ironically and predictably, Biden is now calling for unity which one would expect but I think it’s going to be a while before half the Country embraces the Dems. Good news is the riots should stop. Had it been the other way around, there would be blood in the streets. Can you imagine if Trump was declared the winner by the media? How do you think those folks on the left that have been rioting for months would be acting? Hmm. Oh well, the good news is time doesn’t stop. Things always move forward and things always change. Not always for the best but nothing stays the same so we’ll see what happens.

Time to go. Hope you all are well. Be safe and think for yourself. Don’t listen to the hypocritical politicians as they have one set of rules for you and one for them. An example here was our Mayor of Denver told everyone yesterday morning to stay home and not travel anywhere then right after his news conference, proceeded to get on a plane to Houston and Mississippi to go see his family, ha. He’s received tons of negative feedback rightly so and of course in typical democrat fashion, is now apologizing and asking for forgiveness and wants to move forward. Unbelievable. We shouldn’t be surprised though. In recent weeks, mostly democrats from the Governor of California to Nancy Peolsi and many others have put authoritarian restrictions on us which don’t apply to them. They seem to have forgot, they are elected to represent and work for us, they are not our leaders. Time to kick them all out and start fresh. Good God, God Bless.

Off to Frisco and then Denver in about an hour. Snow stopped and the roads should be better than yesterday. Looks like parts of Denver had more snow than we did. My work calls went well and I’m pretty much done for the month. Lori woke me up last night as she was having a bad dream and scared of something. We watched some Kevin Costner movie that maybe had lingering effects.

I’m stopping at Edwards Meat Market for some steaks and a smoked turkey this morning before heading to my three other stops before heading back up the hill. I’ll get Lori on the way home.

Lots of football tomorrow, whoo hoo. Time to get moving, hope you all have your meal plans set. God Bless.

We have snow! I was going to Denver today but changed it to tomorrow. Smart decision. This system is supposed to be a quick hitter. Should be out of here by noon.

I have round two of my 2021 planning call today and then am done for the week. We’re pretty optimistic about next year as it can’t be as bad as this year. We’re thankful we all survived and have jobs as many people just crashed. Lives have been ruined with all the restrictions. Hope lives have been saved but it’s hard to tell.

Lori needs to be at work around 8 so I’ll drive her. Her car gets snow tires Saturday am while she and Ty are getting haircuts. I switched days yesterday when I checked the weather report. This time the weatherman was right.

We had a showing at Minturn yesterday but no offer yet. Hopefully soon. It’s been a perfect storm with the townhome not selling, mom’s estate and the IRS and Lori and I both taking pay cuts. Not fun in any way at all. Oh well, like I said, many people are way worse off.

Time to go, be safe and well and God Bless.

Could it be that all this talk of a second wave is more hype than reality? Many scientists are now debunking one model the govt. seems to have latched on to saying we’re in the middle of a second wave. In fact, most scientists say there is no second wave at all. Locally we look at the hospital beds and we’re not overwhelmed as the news says. Same is true in Grand Junction where my buddy’s sister is a nurse. They say everything that comes in is being labeled covid. Now I don’t doubt many of them are but then I read that over half of the tests are false positives. I can send a link if anyone is interested but let’s do a little survey. Who here knows someone hospitalized or at least very sick with covid? Anyone? We don’t and we run in a pretty big circle. Let us know. Also wtf was the cell phone alert yesterday? Seems like an overreaction as when we get those we think of a fire close by or a flood or something impending that is going to cause immediate harm. At least 70% of the people on the news agree with me. I guess in a week or so we’ll know more as millions of people are flying or travelling for Thanksgiving despite being told not to. Seems people will listen until it comes down to them personally wanting to do something, ha. Anyhow, this thing needs to just go away and we need to get back to normal.

The Bronco’s won! Whoo hoo! We have a light dusting of snow with more coming they say. We’ll see. It’s beginning to be that you cannot listen to or believe anything anyone says anymore. Pollsters, scientists, doctors, government officials, and yes now even weathermen have been getting things wrong. Now sportscasters too as the Bronco’s were not supposed to have any chance of winning. Just goes to show you, hmm.

Jag has three more days of class before break but Ty is off. I was taking Lori’s car down tomorrow for tires but will go on Saturday due to the snow storm coming. It better arrive. We’re off to the gym at 6:15 so that’s it. be well, be safe, wash your hands and avoid crowds as we’d better error on the side of caution but as I said above, every day it gets harder to believe the talking heads on tv. Wouldn’t it be nice if they are all wrong and there really is no second wave and this is all a big lie? For once, it’d be great for them to be wrong. Just saying. God Bless.

After a busy day in Frisco and Breckenridge with a little bit of normalcy outside of wearing a mask, we decided to call Jag and have him meet us at Matsu in Vail for sushi for dinner on the way home. Man is that place good. We tried a few new things like truffle sea bass that was incredible. Then we all headed home. Tables were spaced out as they were at like 25% capacity.

Today we’ll hang out around here but might go over to Silverthorne to see Marty and Melanie’s new house. Might also hit the gym again early this morning.

We found a fun Christmas store in Breckenridge and the town was packed. You could tell there were a lot of tourists, same in Vail. Guess everyone from the city is trying to get out of there, super. This coming week high season kicks in normally so we’ll see what happens. The ski areas are open but rumor has it Vail will close Monday. I find that hard to believe but we’ll see.

Dogs are out and have been fed. Last night Lee, our cousin, sent me a picture from his 9th birthday party. Now he’s 3 years older than I am so I must have been six. Check out this wild man,

Kind of a grainy picture but that’s me. We wore a lot of cut off jeans back in the day. Funny.

That’s it, have a great Sunday, be well, safe and stay healthy, God Bless.