A Year of Change

Lots going on. Next week is a big week. Technically the week starts on Sunday, so that means tomorrow. We’ll kick it off with the big Bronco game. Ty and his buddies are going, and we’ll be working around the house. Then Monday I need to get the license plates for Ty’s car, Tuesday is Jag’s birthday, Thursday is Tom’s birthday, Friday Jag comes home, and Saturday is our annual cigar fellowship party. Throw in work and you can see, it’s a busy week.

Ty needs to come home after work and do a deep clean on his room. That’s the deal I made with him if he wants the tickets. Lori wrapped some presents yesterday. I got a text yesterday from Hailey up in Cody Wyoming. It seems Nick, this great silversmith from Ft. Worth Texas, finished the boys’ crosses. I asked him to make these over six months ago but had no idea he’d get them done by Christmas. Nick is a really cool, in demand dude that makes really unique heirloom stuff. Even his chains are all handmade, link by link. His stuff isn’t cheap, but it is one of a kind. Luckily, I have some more Pappy’s whisky here at the house and I worked out a favorable trade for both of us. Don’t tell the boys as they’re getting them for Christmas!

I picked up a new star for the top of the tree yesterday as ours stopped working. I went to Home Depot and facetimed Lori so she could pick it out.

Looks like a mild weekend with a little snow maybe up here. If we get any, it’ll be just a dusting. Looks like a pretty good week too with temps warming up and no snow.

Haven’t talked about politics lately but Trump being elected is already making positive changes and he isn’t even in office yet. On the other hand, Biden is doing everything he can to sabotage Trump and hurt the Country. Not only is he granting record pardons, the most in the history of the U.S., for many very bad people, he’s selling off building materials to build the wall, for pennies on the dollar, signing executive orders to prevent laying off worthless employees who haven’t gone to work for years, giving billions of dollars to Ukraine and other countries, and more. He will literally go down as one, if not the, worst President in the history of the Country. Again, at this point, he has no clue what he’s signing. People are just putting pieces of paper in front of him and telling him to sign it.

The Dems apparently still don’t know who won the election. They’re vowing to resist, even though they lost all three branches of government and the popular vote. This won’t age well for them as they’ll lose again in four years if they don’t work with the Republicans to clean up the mess created in the last four years. Only time will tell, but I don’t have high hopes based on their history. God help us.

That’s it, 6:45am. Need to head out to the gym in 15 minutes. Have a great weekend and Go Broncos and God Bless.

Most of us know that Friday the 13th is not some unlucky day, unless you were a Knights Templer. Just another day around here.

Yesterday we went to Glenwood to get Lori’s car looked at. Then we stopped at Target before heading home. I washed the car in Gypsum and then we grabbed lunch to go before returning home. Later in the day, I went to meet up with Mark, Cark and Ken for cigar night. It was good to see the guys.

Today we’ll get some work done around the house. We might run down to Denver tomorrow to wrap up any last-minute shopping we need to do. Monday I’ll be shipping Robi and Bobby’s presents out.

Looks like it’ll be warmer next week through Christmas. Should be in the high 30’s to 40 during the day. We’re trying to decide if we’re going to the game on Sunday or not. We’ll let Ty go either way.

Lori is making our salads for lunch right now. We’ll head out to the gym in 30 minutes or so and then stop to see Ty before starting our day.

Have a great day, be well, stay safe and God Bless.

Cold but clear this morning. We’re running out of time to get things bought, wrapped and shipped for Christmas. This morning we’re running to Glenwood to get the estimate on Lori’s car and will grab a few more things while there. As I said a while ago, we’re scaling back this year. Money is just too hard to come by, plus as you get older, things are not as important as the spirit of the season and being with friends and family.

Last night at 5, I went to the annual homeowners meeting down at City Hall. It was pretty uneventful. Ty works today and tomorrow and Saturday. He wants to go to the Bronco game Sunday. We’ll see.

I had a few good calls yesterday to continue moving forward on one of our new companies. Should have two up and running in January. First up was the developer and then the all-important lawyers. These days, with ever changing laws and regulations, you have to make sure things are structured in the right way, or you can end up with huge tax bills. I think a lot of things will be simplified when the new administration gets in in around 39 days.

Time to get moving. Lori is changing batteries on alarm sensors around the house right now. Think we’ll try to get to the gym before we go to get the Porsche estimate. I’ll move the appointment back and hour or so.

Have a great Thursday, feels like a Friday. God Bless.

Managed to get some things done yesterday, professionally and personally. Big news of the day was Lori crunched her car a bit getting off the highway on the way home. She was coming out of a roundabout, went to change lanes, and clipped the front end of an Audi who was speeding by her. Not much damage to her car but the other guy’s car has a busted headlight and front left fender. In the end, her fault, even though he was speeding past her. We think he had preexisting damage, but we’ll let the insurance company sort that out. She was upset, but I told her no big as shit happens and it’s only a car.

I’m lifting pretty heavy these days at the gym, switching up my workouts. No food today. I’ll wait until tomorrow to eat. Looks like about zero degrees outside. Should be around 30 today.

Two weeks until Christmas. Won’t be long now. Lori is in Frisco today. At least the weather is ok. Not sure what I’ll do today after the gym. Have a great Wednesday and God Bless.

15 days until Christmas! One week until Jag’s 23 birthday, unbelievable. I still have some shopping to do. We’re scaling way back this year though so it’s not as much to do as in years past. Today I’ll try to get some stocking stuffers. I should run down to Denver tomorrow for a quick trip to Cherry Creek. We’ll see.

Snow down in Denver. Nothing new up here. I think I have either Fed Ex or UPS showing up just about every day. Robi’s present should arrive today and then I’ll get hers and Bobby’s stuff out later this week.

Still deciding whether or not we’re going to the Bronco game this Sunday. Ty’s waiting to see if Madi can get the day off. I have to find something for Madi and Ava also.

Lori is in Vail today and Frisco tomorrow. I’m going to tackle my office today. Was trying to get to it yesterday but had too many calls and boxes to wrap up and ship.

That’s about it, time to get moving. Be well, stay safe and God Bless.

Today is Dad’s birthday! Not sure how old he would have been, but it was always the start of the birthday season. Dad’s birthday is today, Tom’s is the 19th and mine is the 29th. Throw in Jagger’s on the 17th and we always had a lot of cake in December.

Yesterday Lori put up lights out front and in the back. The ones out front are so bright, I’m sure you can see them from space! We’re up early as Lori needs to be at work by 7:45 and I have a call at 9.

I managed to clean my closet yesterday and today will try to tackle my office. We also need to get the basement cleaned up as Shultz and Jane will be staying here the night of our party, so they don’t have to drive back to Denver. Throw in the mud room and we have some cleaning to do.

Chiefs won last night on a last second field goal. First time I’ve ever cheered for them as it helped the Broncos. Big game next week for us. I think we’re going with Ty.

6:10am now, time to get moving so I can get to the gym before my 9am call.

Have a great day, only 2 weeks and 2 days until Christmas! Ho Ho Ho! God Bless.

Looks like a little snow tonight and tomorrow, maybe around an inch. So far, it’s been a mild winter, snow wise. Hope that continues. We don’t mind the cold as long as we’re not dealing with feet of snow.

Yesterday Abby and Davy’s decoration people stopped by to give us a quote on putting up Christmas lights on the five trees in the front yard. Are you ready for this? $4300 dollars! You’ve got to be kidding! That’s over $800 a tree! I could buy 5 new trees for less than that, ha.

Lori put up some lights yesterday in the backyard, and it cost us nothing! I’ll do the same today in the front yard.

We’re running a little late as we slept in. K.C. and Shannon, next door to us, and between Davy and us, sold their house! $4.1 million! That means we’re holding steady and should be worth $3.5 million easy. Good to see the neighborhood holding steady.

Lori and Nate, our neighbors on the other side, are seriously talking about how we could all move to Idaho and basically own shares of the hospital. It’d be a big move and wouldn’t happen for a couple years, but it would be a game changer for both of our families. Lori would make a whole lot more money too. We’d like to get Dr. B to go too. In the meantime, Nate (who is a ortho surgeon too), has launched a concierge medicine practice Lori might help with. There are lots of people that are willing to pay extra for better care and for getting in right away. More to come here, but things are coming together for both of us with new opportunities. All this right when we’re figuring out how to retire, ha. Good news is we can do these things (our new companies) from home when we retire. We’re trying to develop mailbox money, meaning just have checks come in the mail every month. That’s the key.

8:12 now so time to go. Football later today but we’re on a bye week. Sunny and nice outside. More Yellowstone tonight, fun. Have a great Sunday, God Bless.

I wrapped up my fast and began refeeding yesterday afternoon. You can’t just eat a burger and fries, or anything you want after not eating for 3 days, or you’ll upset your stomach. You start with electrolytes and then a few hours later some protein. I’ll eat light today too. I had bone broth, then some peanut butter on crackers, and after that, scrambled eggs. Throw in a Gatorade Zero and I was good for the night.

I’m down about 8 pounds but did this more for the internal benefits. Fasting for just 48 hours can clean out your fatty liver, which over 50% of Americans, due to our diet, have. Enough about me, as you probably don’t care anyhow, ha.

Yesterday I went to the gym for some light lifting and a mile on the treadmill and then dropped some cookies and stuff for Dr. B who was in the OR all day. Last night we went down to Nate and Dea’s where Lori and Nate talked for over an hour. Nate wants to move to Idaho and wants us to come and he’ll make Lori his practice manager or director and she would make a lot more money. He went over to the Steadman Clinic from Lori’s place about 18 months ago. Somethings fishy in how they calculate the numbers at Lori’s work and she’s stirring things up. Who knows, she and Dr. B might jump ship. She did go in yesterday and told them, if her bonus, that they magically found after she raised hell, was from a year or two ago, it wasn’t fair for her to have to wait and be paid out over the next few months. So now, after the first payment on her next check, she’ll get the rest at the beginning of the year. That’s better for us as we don’t want to pay taxes on any more money this year anyhow. As I said yesterday, her Company better get it together as if she leaves, it’ll create a domino effect, and I think the whole practice would fold. They’re lucky she doesn’t demand a couple hundred thousand dollar raise. That’s how important she is. We’ll see.

Ty works today. Jag’s been feeling off and we need to get him into the doctor when his finals are over. We think he has an ulcer from stress. We’ll go to the gym today and then stop to see Ty.

It’s the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, what a day in history. That’s it, time to get going. Have a great weekend and God Bless.

Lori and I made it to Denver a bit before 9am. We stopped on Broadway and Alameda to meet Chris (our lawyer) and give him a box of wine for the holidays. He was very appreciative. Then it was on to Phoebe’s for haircuts and color. That took around 2 and a half hours before we were done. We’ve known Phoebe for over 20 years. Funny, when you’ve known someone that long, they’re a part of your life, sort of like family. In 20 years, people grow older, have kids, who grow up, have health issues, get married, and yes, divorced, family members pass away, (all our parents) and more. When you think back, to people you’ve known that long, you’ve gone through a lot together.

We headed up the hill and stopped at Tom’s so Lori could see the new house and we could pick up some cookies. We were sorry to miss Holly as Lori has only met her once and I met have met her maybe twice, not sure. The house is really nice and all decorated. It was a great deal for the money.

We headed out after 15-20 minutes for home and made it to the ranch a little after 3. Roads were fine and traffic was nothing, except for Idaho Springs where they stop traffic for rock scaling. We only had to wait 10 minutes which wasn’t too bad.

I’m in a groove on the water fast. I actually think I could go on longer but will stop this evening. Might wait until tomorrow morning to eat, we’ll see. Off to the gym this morning. Remember, use it or lose it. The body is amazing in how quickly it can transform if you just show it a little love. It’s never too late to start exercising or start eating right. As far as this fasting thing, they say if you want to live a long time, research it.

Trash day so time to clean out the refrigerator. I ordered up the best fruitcake made, so they say, last night. No one is big on fruit cake, but a little slice here and there around the holidays is nice. We’ll probably put it out at our party.

6:25am now. Time to get going. Have a great Friday and weekend. Be well, stay safe and God Bless.

36 hours down, 36 hours to go. I’m right in the middle of my 72 hour water fast. This is where you have only water for 72 hours. Not sure who knows about this, but fasting like this has been around for thousands of years. After 24 hours, your body goes into autophagy. This is where the body essentially starts eating itself. In fact, autophagy in Greek translates to self eating. This is super beneficial as the body breaks up and eats diseased cells, mainly attributed to Alzheimer’s and a number of cancers. Here’s the technical info if you’re interested. If not, skip the next paragraph.

Autophagy (or autophagocytosis; from the Greek αὐτόφαγος, autóphagos, meaning “self-devouring”^[1] and κύτος, kýtos, meaning “hollow”)^[2] is the natural, conserved degradation of the cell that removes unnecessary or dysfunctional components through a lysosome-dependent regulated mechanism.^[3] It allows the orderly degradation and recycling of cellular components.^[4][5] Although initially characterized as a primordial degradation pathway induced to protect against starvation, it has become increasingly clear that autophagy also plays a major role in the homeostasis of non-starved cells.^[6] Defects in autophagy have been linked to various human diseases, including neurodegeneration and cancer, and interest in modulating autophagy as a potential treatment for these diseases has grown rapidly.

Anyhow, surprisingly, I’m not that hungry. I’m super alert and focused and am also down 4 pounds in the first 36 hours. And that’s not water weight as that’s all I’ve had! They say you should do this once a year. Some people do it a couple times a month, or fast for longer, like ten days! No way I could do that, as 72 hours, while so far, isn’t that bad, is enough. So, more water only until dinner time tomorrow night.

Today we’re off to Denver to see Phoebe to get haircuts. I’m also dropping some wine at my lawyer’s office and have a few other stops while Lori’s color is getting done. Tom made Christmas cookies and if we have time, we’ll stop and grab some. We talked for 20 minutes or so yesterday to catch up, glad he’s doing well.

Hope to be home by 3. Not sure if we’re having cigars tonight or not. I personally haven’t smoked a cigar since the Halloween party on October 26th. I just decided to take a break. No particular reason, just on a whim.

Ty’s off today. Jag is working hard at school. Lori had an impromptu meeting yesterday and after continuously complaining about not yet getting her bonus, they miraculously said they made a mistake last year on coding some procedures and owe her $30,000. What really happened is that Dr. B. thought she was going to quit and went in and yelled at the CEO and I think threatened to leave the practice himself if they didn’t take care of Lori. So, in a matter of an hour, they found this missing money. Hmmm. We’ll of course take it, but she shouldn’t have had to wait this long or have this go on this long. They’re also working on a $50,000 raise for her starting January 1. They’d better figure it out as she’s worth way more than that (numbers prove it), and they can’t lose her, or it could (I think would) sink the practice, as Dr. B would not have the patients and revenue without her. It’s so frustrating that people aren’t appreciated until they threaten to leave, or in many cases, do leave their job. Dr. B. saw this coming as Lori sent an email over the weekend with her concerns and frustrations, and that finally got everyone’s attention. I actually wrote the email for Lori to help her get her points across. It was honest, yet critical of everything and everyone, including the CEO. We didn’t know, but Dr. B forwarded the entire email on to Chris the CEO! Well, that stirred things up, and in the end solved things and I think will actually make the company stronger, as he’s now going to be taking Lori’s input on things. Truthfully, Lori would make a better CEO than this guy but that’s not the job she wants. I’m super glad they finally realize and understand what they have in her, as she really is amazing. If we moved to New York or somewhere, she’d be making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Tough day for her, but all’s well, ends well.

Time to get moving, have a great Thursday and God Bless.