A Year of Change

Yesterday the misses was hired as the Director of Social Media for her Doctors plastic surgery practice and skin care line. She received the email around 2:30 right when we were headed out for teacher conferences but was deservedly excited! Yea for her, everyone should call her to congratulate her. I’ll let her tell you more about her duties and her new position. On top of that, two days or so ago, she was selected as a board member for the Colorado Women’s Foundation! This is a really prestigious national organization that empowers young girls and she’ll now join a group of a bunch of fun ladies. What a week for her, great job!

The only thing that could top that (for me anyhow) was that yesterday morning when I was in Boulder meeting with a friend, we were talking about a possible trip to Germany for Pro Wein in March, which is the annual German wine fair. I told her I was so bummed as I didn’t fly enough miles last year for the first time in 8 years to keep my Premier Executive status. Laura immediately said that one of the perks of her being a 1K (the highest level on United) is that she can make one person of her choice, also a 1K! So about ten minutes later, I officially became a 1K! Whoo hoo! Those of you that fly a lot understand how huge this is. They or now “we” have all kinds of perks that the average peasant doesn’t have! I’m pretty excited and am now looking forward to flying soon.

Now to the day. We had teacher conferences yesterday at 3pm. Both boys are excelling as we would expect. The youngest ones teacher said she wished she had a whole classroom of Ty’s while the oldest guys teach said he’s not only understanding his work but being able to explain it and is helping others, we were very proud.

We took the kids to California Pizza Kitchen as a reward for their great performances. Mac and cheese and pizza for them and salads for us.

Today we were supposed to go to a pain management doctor in Boulder for the misses head but after checking them out on HealthGrades, ( an internet site that unbiasedly rates doctors) we’re going to cancel the appointment. There were a number of disturbing testimonials from former patients that just didn’t feel right. On top of that, the misses is not sure how or if we were officially referred or if it was just a suggestion from someone in the office up in Vail as our doctor was on vacation. So we’re putting it all on hold until we can talk to Dr. Corenman himself. Like the misses says, it’s not going to hurt her anymore to wait another week and what if these people screw her up more! I still have another 9am meeting up there so I’ll be off early.

While I’m in Boulder the misses will be working on the rest of the remodel which is wrapping up at the dermatologists office. She’s done a great job there and it’s all starting to come together.

Being Superwoman, she also made the youngest guys Valentines Day box when we made it home from dinner. It’s a 3 foot tall “creeper” which is a character from a game called Minecraft that all the kids play on the computer. Hopefully she can post pictures.

Well it’s about 4:45 and Mojo woke me early as I think he’s itchy from being at the groomer but he’s sleeping fine now, maybe he just wanted breakfast. Oh well, I can get to the gym and be back before anyone wakes up.

I skipped the Big O’s speech as if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. More big government, more spending, more taxes. How can this guy and many people believe that government has the answer to everything. All throughout history, this just has not been the case. We still can’t believe people bought his bull the second time around. He was the only Pres ever in history to get re-elected with the economy in the state it was in. He’s a talker alright. I’ll spare you all on politics today as it doesn’t do much good, as far as I know, anyhow. Hopefully some of you are listening and taking a few precautions as it’s not going to get any better anytime soon.

Time to go, hope everyone is well. Make sure to congratulate the misses on her big week, and best of all, she’s the best Mom and wife anyone could ask for!

God Bless

Yesterday we had basketball, baseball and D.I. Throw in the misses doctor’s appointment, Mojo to the groomer, a trip to the grocery store and lighting place, 3 conference calls, the oldest guys inter-murals at 7am and a 8am trip to Office Depot and the day just got away from us.

Time sure flies. It’ll be summer before you know it, then fall and then another year will be gone. Meanwhile most people just loaf through the day, going about a routine that’s the same day after day. On top of that, we as a people have flat out become soft. God help us should we ever have to live as our grandparents did as I fear we wouldn’t even be able to handle that much less life as it was 100 years ago. Check this quote out from a friend, it might be a little over the top but if you think about it, he’s pretty much spot on.

Not a whole lot here you can argue with. Realizing this is true, we’re surely headed in the wrong direction. When did we turn the corner where people no longer took responsibility or care of themselves and expected the government to take care of them. When or more important, why do we look at all successful people as criminals or bad? Why is success now a bad thing? Isn’t being a hard working farmer a noble profession? I personally think that politicians have created the environment that pushes this agenda. Everything has to be P.C. or politically correct these days. Gays in the Boy Scouts, same sex marriage, not being able to say Merry Christmas anymore or having any reference to God in school plays and on and on. Where does it say that those that work have to give money to those that don’t? Why is it if a republican doesn’t want to own a gun, he doesn’t go buy one but if a democrat doesn’t want to own a gun, he doesn’t want anyone to own a gun? You do realize the basic principal of socialism is equal distribution of wealth and that socialism leads to communism. Fear not though as just like all great civilizations in history, reckless spending and self indulgence will self correct us long before I think we’ll get to that point. Our World is so connected these days that things move so much faster than they did years ago which will speed up the “correction” of our society as we know it. The underlying point here is we cannot continue to spend money we do not have, even though leaders like Nancy Pelosi can get on tv just yesterday and say that Washington doesn’t have a spending problem, unbelievable, who voted for her??? Thankfully 83% of the American people disagree. Hopefully they will vote these misguided people out of office next election.

Alright I’ll stop now. See what you get when I have too much sleep. This morning I’ll be off to Boulder at 8:30 and then home around 11 or 12. Tomorrow we go back to Boulder to another doctor for the misses. I’m not sure what she’s doing today but she did make a giant 4 foot tall box that looks like an Ipod for the oldest guys Valentines Day box. Today she’s building the youngest ones. I’m not sure of the theme.

The oldest did great at baseball. Lots of good kids on the team. The youngest guy slammed his hand in the car door when coming home from basketball practice, ouch! Everyone is still sleeping and it’s 6am. I’m still a little sore from my hard workout the other day so I’ll take a day off from the gym.

That’s about it, maybe todays post will spur some comments as we haven’t heard much from you lately. Hope all’s well, take care and God Bless (I can still say that right?)

Alright, I’ve been sitting on the sidelines long enough. This probably won’t do much good but I’m telling you anyhow. Go buy some extra food, preferably some canned goods like tuna, beans and other things you like to eat. Look for the low sodium versions as canned goods are notoriously high in salt. Most have expiration dates that are at least 2 years out but just so you know, there’s been study after study where canned food has been ok up to 30 years after they were supposed to expire.

You probably haven’t noticed but your food, on average, has gone up over 11% in cost in the past year alone. Now you need to ask yourself, did your income go up 11%? If not, you should get my point. On top of this we are beginning to see shortages of certain foods in the grocery stores. Over the weekend our local Whole Foods was out of lettuce. You might not think this is a big deal but it should be a sign, even though it’s small.

I could go on and on as to what else you should do now to make sure you’ll be ok this year but I’ll let it go. As they say, you can bring a horse to water but you can’t make him drink!

Yesterday I felt like crap. I think I ate some bad food (sausages) in the morning and had a touch of food poisoning. Mom and Ty headed for D.I. and Jag and I ran out to Bass Pro Shop as I had a $25 gift certificate from Uncle T and Aunt B from Christmas. We cruised the isles (yes the ammo isle was flat out empty and crowded with people looking for certain calibers) and dropped a couple of bucks worth of quarters in the machine at the shooting gallery which Jag enjoys. One dad in the ammo isle looked at me with his kids in tow and said “this is crazy”. He wasn’t talking about just how the shelves were bare but also how prices had doubled even on the so called “non military” calibers such as 270 Winchester and other hunting calibers. You had to own a pretty obscure rifle for there to be any ammo you would want. Thankfully they did have some 45.70 ( a huge caliber for my Browning 1886 lever action rifle) so we grabbed a couple of boxes. Now we’re not buying tons of ammo but we are trying to get a few boxes for each gun we own. The main reason here is because prices keep going up and up and supply keeps getting lower and lower.

We also picked up a few cleaning supplies and an extra case for the oldest guys 22 rifle and after letting him play on the boats for 20 minutes or so, off we went for home.

We arrived home a few minutes before Mom and the youngest. Soon both boys were  playing outside. The oldest guy had arranged to play with a friend so Mom agreed to let them start swimming next week. All the boys played hard until 6 or 6:30.

Today Mom has a doctor appointment at 10am and then is working on one of her projects. I have lots to do as well starting with my Monday morning conference call at 9. Mojo who looks like a grey wolf these days with his dirty fur, goes in for a bath at 4pm. Throw in basketball for the youngest and baseball practice for the oldest and here we go again.

Oh, the oldest lost another tooth last night, he has a big gap on the lower left side where a couple of teeth are missing. Hope the tooth fairy came!

Time to run, that’s it for the day. Do yourself a favor and please heed my advice and buy just a few extra cans of food if nothing else. It’s not like they’re going to go to waste!

God Bless.

Yesterday although it was cool and snowed later in the day, Jag and I spent most of it doing something that had to do with baseball. We had a 20% off coupon on the entire purchase at Sports Authority so we headed over for his glove, cleats, shorts and a baseball bat. It wasn’t cheap but what are you going to do, it costs money these days for kids to play sports and there’s not much better to spend it on than your kids, especially if it involves exercise. In fact tonight they both start winter swim practice at the School of Mines, the renowned geology college here in Golden.

Today the youngest and Mom, have D.I. from 11 until 1 so the oldest and I will find something to do. I just finished up some laundry and fed the dogs and it’s 5:39 with everyone else still sleeping. I worked out real hard yesterday and am paying for it today. You have to shock your muscles to get them to grow or basically to have any meaningful impact.

Not a whole lot else going on. We did run to the craft store to get the items needed for D.I. and other than that, just hung out around the house and watched a movie. We have a busy week (what week isn’t) that starts with basketball and baseball practice tomorrow and it doesn’t let up until Thursday afternoon when the kids are out of school for a 4 day weekend.

Maybe the misses will chime in as I have nothing else to say unless I drift into politics which I don’t have the energy for. So take care and have a great day, God Bless.

If any of you have not seen the movie that shares the title of today’s post, it’s a classic. John Wayne at his finest in a WWII movie that’s right up there with the best movies of all time.

Yesterday truly was a really long long day, for everyone in our little clan. I was out the door to the distributor to pick up wine by 7:30 and after a quick pit stop at home, was off again. I returned by a bit after 1pm just as the misses was arriving home from at least 3 trips back and forth to the lighting store and the doctors office. Meanwhile the boys were at school and would stay there until 4pm as they had chess club after school. By the time Mom picked them up and made it home at 4:20 or so (she had to drop a couple more kids off as her friend is still home sick with croup, whatever that is), she only had 10 minutes before jumping back in the car and heading back to school to work he assigned shift at the annual carnival which ran until 8pm. I went shopping at the grocery store as we were flat out of food. $321 later (we were out of vitamin C and D) I arrived home around 7. I would have gone to the carnival but I thought the misses was coming home at 7 when her shift was over. I had the food all put away by 7:20 when the misses called and said she’d probably stay until 8 as the kids were having a blast.

When they came through the door, the boys had a treasure trove of toys in both arms. At the carnival you play games that can earn you tickets that you then can trade in for prizes. Apparently the oldest found a game he could ace and played it over and over raking in large amounts of tickets. He won so many tickets he even “bought” his brother some prizes. Everyone went to sleep by 9 and of course, they’re all still sleeping. It’s a bit after 5 and you know where I’m headed soon.

Today I’m not sure what’s going on. We were supposed to get a little snow but it’s dry outside right now. The east coast though is another story. It seems even though they should be used to it, they’re never quite ready for a storm. The news shows crowds of people lining up to buy water, bread, batteries and other staples, you know, things everyone should always have at home. Living on the east coast, especially in a major city, is a different life.

Still no ammo anywhere. One of my military buddy’s and his father in-law drove around yesterday to all the major sporting goods stores, gun shops and even Wal Mart, looking for ammo to buy but came up empty everywhere. I did manage to find a brick of 22 long rifle (500 rounds) at my local cop shop (our hang out where all the cops and feds shop) for only $36. The guy who owns that shop thankfully isn’t gouging everyone like most other shops.

Strange times we live in. Think back ten years ago and what was different in your life. If you think about it, it’s a totally different world. Sure some things are the same but lots has changed. I won’t go into it but you know what I mean.

Time to run, drink my coffee, read the paper and head off for my workout. Hope everyone is well, take care, stay safe and God Bless.

Boy do we owe Uncle T and Aunt B. Our evening got off to a rocky start when we made it to the Morrison park n ride on time at 4:30 to meet our friend who was going to Colorado Springs with us, only to see her pull in a few minutes later with a police car right behind her with his lights on. She supposedly ran a yellow or red light and was pulled over which meant we would start the evening off at least 20 minutes late. It seemed to take forever for the guy to write her a ticket and while doing so the misses was taking photos with her cell phone. Soon we were on our way with and the girls had the incident posted on Facebook within minutes.

We made it to our destination which was Glen’s incredible home perched high above the Broadmoor Resort in a gated community. I won’t go into all the details of the home but it was like it was out of a James Bond movie. Everything from the windows to curtains to lights to the coffee maker and all the audio systems were computerized. Our friend Glen made all his money developing Google Earth or something like that. He had huge telescopes all around and pictures of him and Stephen Hawking (the world famous astrophysicist) around the house. Anyhow after a quick tour (the view was spectacular as he bought up all the surrounding property so no one could build in front of him) we headed down the hill to the Broadmoor for dinner. I’m not sure of the name of the restaurant we ate in but the food was good. By the way, the place was packed! No recession there.

We knew Glen from various parties and functions over the years but missed his Christmas party this year so he’d been inviting us down since the holidays to get together.

Upon leaving, and I’m not sure how it came up, Glen offered up his house to us next week from Wednesday through the following Monday. You see our kids have a 4 day weekend and Glen is taking his kids ski team to Glenwood Springs for 5 days. He insisted we take his house even after numerous attempts by us to politely decline. Finally we gave in as the house is right across the street from the famous Cheyenne Mountain Zoo that the kids love. In order for us to know how to operate everything in the house, (since it’s all computerized) we had to drive back up to his house above the Resort and get a quick tutorial on all the electronics. This took another 15 minutes which when added to our late start, put us back in Denver at 11:15! So, this is why we owe Uncle T and Aunt B big time, for making them stay up so late.

Earlier in the day the misses had her interview for one of her new jobs and had to go by the art gallery she works with as well. Before that she and I ran to a lighting wholesale shop downtown and then delivered some sconces to the other doctors office that she is remodeling. Throw in a trip by me to meet a buddy and a couple of other quick errands, and picking up the kids along with an extra kid at 3:30 from school, and the day flew by.

Today I need to get to the distributor early and pick up some samples, then get to a shop at 10:30 to pick up another bottle I need and then head to Boulder where I’ll hopefully arrive by 11am or so. I then need to get home by around 1 as I’m meeting another friend. Tonight we have the annual school carnival which I think the misses and the youngest have volunteered to work. And so it goes, busy busy busy.

It’s now 6:45 and everyone else is still sleeping. Time for me to run and get showered to start the day. Hope everyone has a great weekend, take care and God Bless. Maybe the misses can post the picture she took of our friend and the policeman later!

Last night the youngest guys basketball team almost pulled out a victory. In the end they lost by 4 points but this was to a team that beat them by 80 points last year! It was quite exciting.

Here’s a comment from yesterday’s post. We can always count on Grandma Annette, thanks,

I was going to talk about the Pres yesterday saying he has the right to kill anyone including Americans but I didn’t think many of you would care, so I thought I’d address something more important, we’re out of half and half for our coffee! I wonder what kind of uproar would be going on if George Bush were still in office. I bet it would be on the front page of every paper and their would be protests in the streets over a Pres saying he can kill any American at any time. The funny thing is all these things the Pres now does are the same things he feverishly campaigned against when he was a senator and when George was in office. My how things change. Scary times, thankfully at least a dozen democratic senators have a problem with this. I could go on and on but as I said, we’re out of freakin coffee creamer!

Today the misses is working at the dermatologists office as the electrician is coming in and she needs to show them where to hang some lights. The dogs are finally going to the groomer as well which is long overdue. Too bad it’s going to snow this weekend as they’ll be getting all dirty again but we can’t wait any longer.

The youngest just came down and it’s only 5:15. He says he has some homework to do. The oldest and I didn’t make it to the store for his baseball cleats as he had a school project he wanted to get done. We’ll try to get there today.

The misses has another meeting wearing her social media director hat tomorrow for another doctor and might take on our friends business as another client. She’s really busy these days with a lot of irons in the fire, good for her. Time for me to read the paper and see what I can use for coffee creamer so here’s the misses…..

The oldest’s school project was creating a model of a plant or an animal cell.  We stopped at the dollar store for multi colors of play dough and made a homemade batch of white dough for the Cytoplasm.  My Grandma used to make play dough for me when she lived with us. She always put food coloring in for the desired color of dough I requested. The oldest finished his master piece and used the computer to type the names of the cell parts and print them in the colored text to match.  He cut out the names and a definition and glued the papers to different sized tooth picks and skewers.  After that he placed the flags(so to speak)in the coordinating part of the cell. It looks pretty cool and it is not due until Friday.  Way to get the project out of the way!

The youngest had a Student Council meeting yesterday.  Right now the kids are collecting “Pennies for Patients”. They are collecting spare change to donate to the kiddos with cancer at Children’s Hospital.  The Council has to come up with the ideas on there own.  As I have mentioned in a previous post one of their classmates has been battling cancer since 2008.  Sometimes he comes to school with his IV attached…lately he has been too weak to make it. Earlier this year the students raised $4000. dollars to donate to his medical bills…5 years of Dr. bills even with insurance has got to be overwhelming. So, now it is “Pennies for Patients”…We are blessed to have such compassionate kiddos at our school.

The oldest is still fast asleep and the reason for the youngest getting up so early is that he fell asleep a few minutes after 7p.m. while I was reading Lord of The Rings to him.  The first few chapters of the book don’t quite grab you quite the the opening sequence of the movie. We will see how it goes…

I am off to start breakfast.  Have a great day.

God Bless

We heard yesterday the Jagger had made the Ironbirds Baseball team in Golden. They picked up three kids and he was one of them. This is quite an accomplishment as like I said before, he hasn’t played in almost 4 years. The Wheat Ridge team was still lobbying us last night even after I told him we were going to Golden. Our friend who is a championship baseball coach says you can’t teach size (which Jag has) but you can teach baseball. All along he told me not to worry and that he’d end up on a good team. Practice starts next Monday February 11th so here we go!

Yesterday was a blur with D.I. and basketball practice for the youngest. I managed to get the basement all cleaned up which is a really big deal. I was so much on a roll that I accidentally shredded a check from Blue Cross that I just received as reimbursement for a recent trip to the dentist. Thankfully they’re sending me another one today.

The misses was down at the doctors office that she’s redecorating and then at school helping out in the classroom until 1:30. Before we knew it, the day was gone.

I’m not sure what’s all going on today but I’m going to try to take the oldest to the batting cages right after school to get him some more practice. They say we might get snow this weekend which will be good for the lawn. I also need to try to find some more 22 long rifle ammo today as even that seems to be sold out everywhere.

Apparently not very many people trust the govt. when it come to the 2nd Amendment. The funny thing is that the Pres will get on tv and say that the majority of Americans support banning this and that when the truth is the majority of Americans absolutely don’t! The one exception I think most everyone is ok with is universal background checks, even though criminals won’t register!  Funny that he never mentions his hometown of Chicago that has the strictest gun laws in the Country, stricter than what he’s proposing, yet has a murder rate of 19 per 100,000 verses 4 per 100,000 in the rest of the Country. You know why don’t you, because criminals don’t follow the law! Oh well, the Country is stocking up as you can’t find much ammo anywhere much less any guns at a reasonable price. I’d better stop now before I alienate some of you.

So take care, have a great day and if you see any 22lr ammo anywhere, pick us up a few hundred rounds, it shouldn’t cost more than $50! God Bless

Although I wanted the Niners to win, I wouldn’t have minded the loss if there wasn’t such poor officiating late in the game. I know you can’t look at one play but there was a clear penalty in the end zone with time running out. Oh well, after Denver’s loss a few weeks ago, nothing much could be worse.

The oldest guys tryouts yesterday went well. A coach at the end came up and said he’s going to draft him as he held the bat well and could tell he is a natural athlete. He did really well considering he hasn’t played in 4 years, we were really proud of him.

Uncle T and Aunt B came up before the game and he and I played football outside with the boys and two of their friends. We also had a lot of food that we just kind of grazed on during the day. Finally we wrapped up the day and headed to bed around 9 or so after the game. We all slept in this morning and woke up about 6:30. I almost got up at 3:30 or 4 when I woke up in bed but went back to sleep instead.

Same old same old this week, lots to do and we’re busy every single day after school with some kid activity. Today it’s d.i. and basketball practice for the youngest while the oldest needs a new baseball glove. Too bad money doesn’t grow on trees!

Time to go, have a great day and stay safe and take care. God Bless.