A Year of Change

Ok, what are you doing today? Are you shopping for a new tv? Going to dinner with friends? Getting ready to go golfing or boating this weekend, or something else that seems normal activity for ones life in our economically sound, crime free, inflation proof country.

I’m sure you see where I’m going so if you want to stop reading now, go ahead. My point is, yes, we have to live life, we can’t live everyday in constant fear of the World falling apart, I get that. But on the other hand, wouldn’t it be prudent to take one day a week, or even 2 or 3 hours a week, to prepare yourself for hard times ahead. This could be the loss of a job, a major illness, a terrorist attack or a trucker strike. I could get really detailed here and post up some government studies that show scenarios of what they think is going to happen this year, or next or the year after. My point is, the govt. is preparing (that’s such a bad word as it conjure up thoughts of crazy survivalists) so why aren’t you?

Many people smarter than you or I are taking the threat, whatever it may be (economic, terrorism, climate change, food safety, etc.) very seriously. We’re getting to the point where you just can’t ignore where we’re headed anymore. Some of you are maybe older and think “well, nothing’s going to happen here or to me, the govt will take care of things”. Well guess again. The other day I mentioned the 67 year old veteran who was arrested for asking city council members to speak up at a meeting, are you kidding me? Oh well, if you’re still reading, maybe there’s a little hope for you as most people in our country just stick their head in the sand at this kind of talk. If you feel you can’t do anything or don’t know what to do, give us a call. Something as simple as having 4 five gallons of water in your basement and a half a dozen bags of rice and a few cases of canned food along with 3 months worth of pet food, can go a long long way. Alright, I’ll stop now, but do yourself a favor and just think for yourself for a minute. Who will take care of you when everyone needs help.

Now to the day, the boys played hard while I spent most of the day at the phone store getting a new phone. Mom made it home around 6:30 and was straight off to bunko as the neighborhood girls started a club last night. I didn’t get a chance to talk to her to see how it went but I’m sure she had fun.

This morning I have a sales meeting and then this afternoon I’m taking the boys to a VIP event at the football stadium where they get to meet and play soccer with the players from Manchester United Football Club (soccer) from England. Now the Denver Broncos have 3 million face book like and these guys have like 60 million! They are the most popular sports team in the World. The sales manager at the chevrolet dealer gave me the tickets along with field passes. Tomorrow is the game against Roma (the team from Rome Italy) but I gave those tickets away as we’ll be in Aspen. It should be fun, I’ll try to take pictures.

Now before we go, read this, another example of our out of control whoever they are,

A Boy Scout troop from the nation’s heartland is demanding answers and a U.S. senator is expressing outrage after a group of scouts was detained by federal agents and one child allegedly was held at gunpoint.

Jim Fox, the leader of the Mid-Iowa Boy Scout Troop 111, said the incident occurred earlier this month at a checkpoint along the Alaska – Canada border. The scouts and their leaders were on a 21-day trek from Iowa to Alaska – a trip that had been three years in the planning.

As their vans were moving through a checkpoint into the United States, one of the scouts snapped a photograph. Agents stopped the van and ordered all the passengers to get out. They told the underage photographer that he had committed a federal crime.

“The agent immediately confiscated his camera, informed him he would be arrested, fined possibly $10,000 and ten years in prison,” Fox told Des Moines television station KCCI.

During the search, one of the scouts tried to retrieve a bag from the roof carrier. When he turned around, Fox said an agent had a loaded pistol pointed at the child.

“He heard a snap of the holster, turns around, and here’s this agent, both hands on a loaded pistol, pointing at the young man’s head,” Fox told the television station.

The scoutmaster wrote a detailed account of the incident on his Facebook page. He said he tried to watch the agents search the van but was ordered to return to his vehicle. An agent followed him and told the youngsters “that the next one to leave the van would be handcuffed and detained.”

“The agent in charge informed me of the potential charges against (the) scout and informed me it is a violation of federal law for any American to take a picture of a federal agent or any federal building,” Fox wrote.

Fox said he and another member of the troop were interrogated by agents – forced to answer questions about their background.

They also wanted to know why the Boy Scouts were hauling “excessive amounts of lighters, matches and knives.”

Oh, for goodness sake, people. (Sorry, I’ll try to refrain from further editorializing.)

After a lengthy delay, the scouts were released without any charges being filed.

“The boys were unnecessarily frightened and intimidated,” Fox wrote. “When do we Americans decide enough is enough? The TSA and border guards are a valuable asset to the safety of this country, but to have such Gestapo tactics against a teenage scout is uncalled for.”

Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, agrees.

“It’s outrageous that a border patrol agent would point a gun at a boy scout just for taking a picture,” he told the television station. “It just doesn’t make sense.”

The senator’s office said they are looking into the matter.

Robert Hooper, the scout executive for the Mid-Iowa  Council of the BSA, told me they, too, are upset and disturbed by the allegations.

“The guys were in scout uniforms,” he said. “I would like to know what caused this to happen. It does sound pretty extreme.”

Indeed, it does. It’s not like they were attempting to cross into the United States illegally.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said they’ve had a chance to investigate – and they can’t find anything out of the ordinary.

“CBP takes any allegations of wrongdoing very seriously,” read their official statement. “CBP’s review of this group’s inspection, including video footage review indicates that our officer did not un-holster or handle his weapon as stated in the allegation. The review revealed nothing out of the ordinary.  We have reached out to the Boy Scout troop for additional information in reference to the allegation.  The video footage has been referred to CBP Internal Affairs for further review.”

So, what we have here is an old-fashioned case of he said, he said – or to be more accurate – the Boys Scouts said, the feds said.

In cases like this, the quickest way to determine who is being truthful is to look at the video. So I emailed U.S. Customs and Border Protection and officially requested a copy of the video.

My request was denied.

I also asked for a copy of the statute that criminalizes Photography 101. I’ve yet to receive a reply.

Fox is still fired up over how his scouts were treated – and I can’t say I blame him.

“This was an illegal search and intimidation of Americans returning to their home country,” he said.

So let’s review, good readers.

While hordes of illegals are stampeding across our southern border unimpeded, federal agents along our northern border detained and harassed a group of law-abiding American Boy Scouts.

I wonder what kind of merit badge they’ll get for that?

It’s now 5am, see what you get when I get up at 4:30 (thanks Mojo!) so guess I’ll head to the gym. Hope all’s well, God Bless.

Guess who said that? I’ll tell you at the end of the post. So yesterday was busy busy busy, what’s new, right? Today we have more of the same. Vinny was over yesterday afternoon and will be back at 11am this morning until 3pm. We kind of trade off and they have Ty over much more than we have Vinny, so I couldn’t say no.

I managed to get a bunch of laundry done and put away! (we usually just stack it on chairs and stuff) Today I have a few more boxes of wine to ship and then I’ll get ready for a sales meeting I have tomorrow. Then we’re off to Aspen Saturday for a party and a few business meetings, and then we’ll be back Sunday.

I’ll give you a clue on the quote in the title of the post (now don’t scroll down), so here it is. I believe he was in his first movie when he was 35!

Alright, yesterday we had a carjacking by a young kid with a rifle and his underage girlfriend on Lookout Mountain, seems like the natives are restless. But seriously, carjackings here, in our part of town, my my my. Throw in the 67 year old veteran who was arrested for asking the city council to speak up as no one could hear them in their “public” meeting or the dad who was arrested for keeping his 9 year old home from church one Sunday or any other of the ridiculous overreactions that happen daily in our Country, and Lucy, we have a problem. (that’s from the Lucille Ball Show)

Well, guess I’ll head to the gym, oh yea, the quote in the title was from one of the greatest American’s to ever live, John Wayne, God Bless you and God Bless America!

It’s the 20th day over 90 degrees, probably about 98 today. I’m running the sprinklers right now but the lawn is still starting to turn brown.

At 8:05 this morning Jagger gets his cast off and then another x-ray to see what’s going on. Then we’ll either get a new cast or hopefully, just sent home without one. He’s really wanting to get it off, no swimming with a cast on you know.

Ben made it home from 2 weeks in Cabo last night and headed straight over here to catch up on the time he missed playing. Of course he spent the night.

Lots of work to do trying to wrap up the month, it seems like we never have enough time.

Now in these days of political correctness where our govt won’t allow the word God or any type of prayer anywhere anymore, here’s a bit of history from President Roosevelt. It’s about as opposite as you can get from the current administration and it’s war on God and Christianity. Anyhow, read it, you’ll be glad you did, (I hope).

Franklin D. Roosevelt
1944-45

My fellow Americans: Last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far.
And so, in this poignant hour, I ask you to join with me in prayer:

Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity.

Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.

They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.

They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest-until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men’s souls will be shaken with the violences of war.

For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and good will among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.

Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom.

And for us at home – fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas – whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them – help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.

Many people have urged that I call the Nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.

Give us strength, too – strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our armed forces.

And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.

And, O Lord, give us Faith. Give us Faith in Thee; Faith in our sons; Faith in each other; Faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.

With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogancies. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister Nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.

Thy will be done, Almighty God.

Amen.

Citation: Franklin D. Roosevelt: “Prayer on D-Day,” June 6, 1944.

Well if it wasn’t 100 yesterday, it sure felt like it. Thankfully it was a little overcast which helped. Mojo was at the groomer most of the day but was still hot when he came home. He still has a ton of fur. You don’t see a lot of malamutes in Hawaii for a reason.

I read an interesting fact yesterday, our Pres has played 186 rounds of golf in 6 years! That’s over 30 a year, pretty good average for a player. Too bad he’s supposed to be running the Country.

I don’t have much else to say. I was to the distributor and back by 8am and had loaded and unloaded 80 cases of wine by 8:30. Not a lot else going on that would interest any of you as if we didn’t get any comments after Mt Evans or our stripper pole bus, you wouldn’t really care, so have a great day and GB.

Ok, we left at 9 am in a chauffeured driven bus (not as fancy as it sounds) lined with black leather seats, mirrored ceilings and a stripper pole right in the middle. We found a girl, who’s a single Mom from Mexico with a 5 year old who started her own company, who was willing to take the trip for part cash, part wine. So we loaded everyone up and brought some snacks and drinks for the adventure. When the bus arrived it didn’t quite look like the one on the website on the outside but the inside was well, as I described, so we decided to make the best of it and go. The Harris’s paid some cash and we kicked in an old case of samples and off we went. We made it to Cheyenne by a little after 11 and hit the rodeo.

They had a carnival, all kinds of booths and of course the rodeo. I managed to talk all of us into the grandstands for no charge where we took a breather from all the rides and activities to watch the bronc riding and steer wrestling. Finally around 3 or so we called Nancy (our driver) who picked us up and we headed home. Thankfully the traffic coming down from Wyoming is nothing like coming back from the mountains and we were home by 5.

It was hot but not too bad considering it was like 100 degrees. Today we’re back at it. I need to run so I can go pick up a pallet of samples by 7am and get back for my 9am conference call. That’s it for today, hope all’s well, God Bless.

Yesterday, we climbed our first 14’er (a mountain over 14,000 feet tall) as a family. We made it up to Summit Lake by 10:30 or so and were at the summit of Mt Evans by noon. The views were spectacular and just driving up there was pretty scary as you’re so high up and one wrong move and you’d drop thousands of feet off the side. It was hazy until we were at the top as the smoke from the wildfires in Washington State are now in Colorado. When we were on top though, we were above it but you could see the blanket of smoke that you’d just come through. We ran into mountain goats and bighorn sheep along the way. Lori will post some pictures. You can click on pictures to make them larger! We then headed down the mountain for home and arrived mid afternoon. Mt Evans is about an hour drive or so from our house without traffic.

The Harris’s then invited us over for dinner and being tired and not wanting to cook, we accepted. By the time dinner was over, we decided to all go to Cheyenne Frontier Days today in Cheyenne Wyoming. This is the big 10 day rodeo known as the Grandaddy Of Them All. More on this tomorrow including how we’re all getting there as it’s going to be quite fun. I haven’t been there since I was a kid when my Mom won a duck she named Ralph. Ralph turned out to be Ralphina as she was soon laying eggs at home. We’re leaving at 9am and should be home around dinner time. This will be one the kids will remember their whole lives, trust me.

Last, James Garner dies last night. I grew up watching him in movies and on tv. My favorite role was when he played Bret Maverick, a funny, smart, cowboy gambler who was always a step ahead of everyone else. Years ago, tv was much better and although movies are technologically advanced these days, lots of those were better too in my opinion.

Time to get moving and dust off our boots and grab our hats as the rodeo is calling. Hope all’s well, take care and God Bless.

Ok, I think I’ve figured it out, it’s our freakin bed! Yesterday I went to the gym and basically worked my head and neck pain right out of my body only to have it return last night sleeping in our bed. So that’s it, it’s our freakin bed, I wonder how much that has been contributing to Lori’s issues. Now I think we’ve only had it three or four years but apparently it’s toast. Just like finding the perfect pair of socks, finding the right bed is also a life long pursuit. Guess we’ll need to have a garage sale or something to come up with the cash. I’ll have to put a new suit on the back burner, super.

Now to yesterday, I had my conference calls until 12:45 which was a bit longer than I had hoped. When I finished I received a email on my phone from Uber. If you don’t know who they are, they’re the on demand car service nationwide that you click on an app on your phone and they come get you and take you anywhere and you just get out and don’t pay as your card is already set up. Well yesterday all across the country as a promotion, they had Ice Cream and Swag delivery. So I had Jag open the app and click it (I put the app on his phone in case he ever needs a ride in an emergency like Mom and Dad can’t get home) and 20 minutes later they showed up where we were with ice cream and swag which was Uber head bands and sunglasses. The two guys took pictures of the boys which will probably be on their website soon, what fun. Next up I took them to Heritage Square for some fun. They rode the go karts, zip line, alpine slide and a few other rides. Then we hit the grocery store for some much needed food.

Mom made it home about the same time as we did. We made some scallops with jalapeño jelly for a quick stand up dinner and then decided to watch a movie. Today we might go for a hike up to Mt Evans.

Here’s a scry comment from Annette,

Well where do I start, yesterday a jet was shot down over Ukraine, Israel invaded Palestine and Obama held a couple of fundraisers in New York. Nice to see he has his priorities straight. We shouldn’t be surprised though as last time there was a big tragedy like our embassy attack overseas, he jetted off to Vegas for a fundraiser also. Now you might not think twice about this but I’m just shocked. I’m sorry but you wouldn’t see Reagan or Eisenhower playing politics with this going on. My oh my are we in trouble. But wait, he did secretly sign another Executive Order banning any gun made in Russia, that’s going to help, right.

Last night Lori and I and the boys went to 240 Union for dinner as it was too late when she arrived home and we didn’t have anything to cook. Big mistake, I don’t know when we’ll learn as every time we go there the food is terrible. Maybe this time I’ll write it down somewhere so I remember.

This morning I have my last two calls, one at 9 and the other at 10:30. Then I’m taking the boys to Heritage Square which is sort of an amusement park. My neck and shoulder have been killing me for a few days now since I carried a bunch of wine. This of course radiates up my neck and gives me a headache. Kind of a mini version of what the misses had. Man I need a massage!

Time to get coffee as that helps, hope all is well. God Bless.

Well, I took Jag to the ortho doc yesterday morning at 9:30 and an hour later we left with a nice blue cast on his right forearm. They’re not sure how much of a break it is but it’s by his growth plates so the procedure is to put a cast on, wait a week, take it off and then take another x-ray. Either way the cast most likely goes back on then for a bit longer. Thankfully the doctor says his growth plates are not displaced so no long term damage will occur. Anyhow there goes another $800 out the door or wherever it goes. Glad he’ll be ok.

Today we’re both off to work again, what’s new. It rained hard on and off yesterday which is good for the grass. I made a crab salad and steak for dinner last night which was pretty good even though we all just stood around the kitchen island and grazed as we were so hungry and too tired to sit down. We both just have too much work to do each day. We need about 9 days in the week. I had to run downtown and pick up a new pair of shoes for our friend in Aspen and while I was there they had a sale going on all the mens suits. Everything was half price and then another 10% off! Now in case you don’t know, a nice suit, (not a great one but yes a nice one) costs about $2500 these days. So in this case it’d be $1250 less $125 less $200 in birthday gift cards they send me every year. This would make it $925 so I might just have to pull the trigger as I don’t own a single suit, we’ll see.

Ok, that’s about it, lots to do and little time to get it done in. Mojo goes in this afternoon for a much needed haircut.

For those of you that know Applejack, Alan passed away. He was the owner and long time friend of my Mom and Dad. Everyone knew and liked him a lot. Not sure when the funeral is but I’ll probably go.

Live each day people! Take care and God Bless!

This morning I need to take Jagger in as we think he broke his arm. He was riding his BMX bike last night and fell and put his arm down to brace himself. He kept playing but said it hurt and wrapped it in an Ace Bandage. Later in the evening it was really bothering him. Ty’s ankle was also banged the other day and has swollen up a bit too so maybe we’ll just have them both checked out. Problem is I have conference calls at 9, 10 and 12 noon. I’ll have to skip one or more as I think I’d better get him in as soon as I can.

It’s going to be soggy with rain on and off most of the day. That’s ok with us as we can always use the moisture. That’s about it as I need to look up and see when the doctor opens and hit the shower. I’ll keep everyone posted as to how the boys are. GB.