A Year of Change

That’s right, tonight is “back to school night” which is an event for the parents to come with the kids and meet the teachers and I guess, see the school. We will be going (even though we really don’t need to) as it’s an annual event with free pizza for the kids. It’s really just a social event.

Yesterday I picked up the boys from school (the misses was working, remember?) and the oldest told me his teacher wanted to talk to me because he fell in the classroom. I asked him if he was ok and he said “yea” and didn’t understand what the big deal was. So the 3 of us (the boys and I) went to his classroom to see his teacher. She said she just wanted to make sure I knew he tripped and hit his knee. Apparently he tripped over something and banged his knee on something else. This of course was nothing compared to the daily crashes our boys get into but it was nice of her to let me know. I took the opportunity to ask how he was doing and she replied “just great, I hope he really likes 4th grade, I am really glad he’s in my class!”. She went on to say how well he’s doing in detail and what a pleasure, help and joy he is in class. Now this is the first time I’ve had a chance to talk to her so it was good to hear that she too knows what a great kid he is.

The boys and I headed home where I had to jump on the phone while they read some books and grabbed a snack. After a brief spat over some candy bar, all was fine. I tried to clean up the kitchen before the misses arrived home at 5. After a quick clean, the boys and I, just for fun, jumped in the car and drove down to the local motorcycle shop. You see ever since last weekend, it’s all we’ve heard about. I understand this, being a kid and all of a sudden getting the “itch” for something so I decided to let them go dreaming. I told them that if, and it’s a big if, they ever get a motorcycle, it could only be a dirt bike or one that could not be ridden on the roads. My only problem with motorcycles has always been the other people on the roads that could hit you. Most injuries are from riders getting hit by cars, not from motorcycles crashing on their own. Dirt bikes are designed to be ridden “off road” on dirt trails and are actually really fun. I remember as a kid riding my friends Yamaha YZ350 quite a bit off road and boy was it a blast. This sudden infatuation of course is all my buddy Brad’s fault for insisting they get to ride his kids new bike last weekend. To compound the issue, the oldest ones classmate and family friends (Vinnie) all have dirt bikes and ride as a family. The mom, dad and both boys (about the same age as ours) all go riding a bunch. This is one more piece of logic the oldest is using in his argument for us all getting bikes. He comes up with things like “it’d be good for the family and something we could all do together”, boy is he a smart one! Anyhow we arrived at the dealer only to run into Dale, the former head of the meat department at Whole Foods! We’ve known Dale for years and I knew he worked at a motorcycle shop and was a racer as well, but I forgot that this was where he know worked. He gave us the inside tour and scoop on everything and thankfully I made it clear to the boys ahead of time that we were “just looking”. With winter coming on, I’ll get a reprieve until spring so we’ll wait and see if they still have the itch then.

We hurried home to meet up with Mom and warm up some leftover enchiladas for dinner. The rest of the night was pretty uneventful with a little tv and conversation before bed. Today it’s raining lightly with snow above 10,000 feet. Look out, here it comes! This will be the first day the boys will wear long pants to school marking the official change of the seasons.

I have about 4 hours of calls this morning with 3 different producers (winemakers) in Italy and we also need to take our truck into the shop due to the “check engine” light that is stuck on. I did have the plumber come over last night around dinner to check our pipes and sewer smell in the basement. The power of prayer works in mysterious ways as it turns out the smell was from a drain or vent pipe that for the 10 years we’ve lived here, had never been capped! Bob the plumber told me it’ll cost $100 to solder on cap but that that would fix the problem and our main sewer line is just fine, whew, what a relief. We surely didn’t need to deal with that!

I think I’ll skip politics today as I don’t want to lose any of you. The family is doing well, still fighting to keep up with all the bills and cleaning but overall everyone is happy and well. We hope everyone out there is well too. I’ve been trying to get the misses to write for a day or two and hope you will all get to hear from her maybe on Friday.

Anyhow, take care, God Bless and stay safe.

After a 3 day weekend, today marks the first full week of September. It was a much needed break for our family after a hectic month at work and school starting in what was still really the middle of summer.

It’s 5am, as usual, and everyone is still sleeping. The misses works today from 9:30 until 5. Thankfully it’s a bit cooler today with the projected high in the low 80’s. Yesterday it snuck back into the 90’s, or at least felt that way. I just finished folding a load of laundry and putting another one in the dryer. It seems like we’re doing a couple of loads around here almost daily.

Yesterday we started out the day with some house cleaning and the misses working on her replica of a pirate ship for the school dance coming up in 10 days. Now it’s not life size but is built to scale. She’s done an amazing job and it’s fun to watch this project take shape. I wanted to go to the gym and the boys didn’t so they asked if we could call Uncle T and Aunt B to see if they could go visit. Of course, as usual, the answer was yes so off they went down the street on their bikes. I headed to the gym but the misses decided she would rather take a run which turned out to be the wise decision. When I arrived at the gym there were so many people it seemed like January 1st. (the gym’s always crowded this day due to all the New Year resolutions) With all these people it was difficult to find an open weight machine and on top of that, it flat out smelled. I could only stand this for about 15 minutes and then had to leave. When I got home Mom was still working on her ship (which now looked like it could float!) and I took off for the grocery store to buy some food for dinner. While driving the oldest called me on my cell and asked if they could go to lunch with Uncle T and Aunt B which of course they love to do. I told them to use their best manners and have a good time. Meanwhile the misses began the process of cooking up a holiday meal of enchilada’s, rice and beans for Grandma, Uncle T, Aunt B and our family. We all went up to Grandma’s around 6pm with the food in the back of the car to get together for dinner. The misses is really amazing to get all done that she does on any given day. On top of it all, she never complains about anything. Almost everyone else I know would at least utter some sort of complaint about something but not the misses, she just rolls up her sleeves and gets it done. Speaking of my little angel, here she comes now, almost sleep walking as she stumbles past me on her way to the waiting coffee pot.

We all enjoyed the dinner and some conversation but headed home around 7:45 or 8pm. With today being a school day, we needed to get the boys to bed early. They went to sleep after eating a second meal once they got home. I can’t really give them any grief over this as Uncle T and I did the same thing when we were young. In fact, most of our day when we were kids, was all built around eating!

It’s a short week with only 4 days of school and we’re supposed to go to the Children’s Hospital Gala this Saturday. As I said earlier, it’s black tie and we’re now thinking of passing this up as it just seems like a lot of work. We also have the little guys first soccer game at 3pm and the event begins at 5:30 at the Hyatt downtown. We need to decide today so I can let our hosts know if we’re not coming. Personally I’d rather head to the mountains or Wyoming before the snow falls.

OK, This is the point where you can tune out if you don’t want to read any musings on today’s economy. I do hope that you’ll at least scan the rest of the post as it’s not so much my opinion but rather that of others, I think you’ll be surprised at what you read. If you like, you can jump down to the last paragraph and avoid reality which is pretty depressing.

The economy is now getting really bad. I know I talk about this a lot but I think we’re really getting into dangerous waters. Europe and Asia had dramatic losses yesterday while we were all enjoying our hot dogs and hamburgers. I think the stock market will go way down today and gold has a chance to go up again today. I sure hope I’m wrong about everything but if you look at the facts, it’s pretty depressing. Our dollar has lost over 60% of it’s purchasing power in the last 5 years, food prices are soaring and so is our debt. Meanwhile the general public, including some of us, have the boiling frog syndrome. For those of you that don’t know, if you put a frog in boiling water, it’ll jump out, however if you put him in room temperature water and turn on the heat, he’ll just sit there and boil to death. This is kind of like what is happening to all of us. We’re so conditioned to all the bad things around us through the slow methodical ruining of America, that we all just take it as normal. Think about it, our credit ratings has been downgraded for the first time in history, we have unsustainable debt with no way out, record unemployment, rising food prices, zero jobs created in August, a sinking dollar and no compromise in Washington. I could now list a whole bunch of articles supporting the problems we face but one stuck out yesterday. It seems that Goldman Sachs has just circulated a memo to it’s biggest (institutional) investors to bet on America and the World’s economy collapsing. Here’s the link and the first paragraph if you’re interested.

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/even-goldman-sachs-secretly-believes-that-an-economic-collapse-is-coming

Goldman Sachs is doing it again.  Goldman is telling the public that everything is going to be just fine, but meanwhile they are advising their top clients to bet on a huge financial collapse.  On August 16th, a 54 page report authored by Goldman strategist Alan Brazil was distributed to institutional clients.  The general public was not intended to see this report.

If you read this report, you’ll see that they believe the world economy is going to collapse and they are telling their clients how to profit from this. Now I don’t know about you but these guys were the only ones to make money in the last debacle known as the mortgage meltdown of 2008. Here’s a bit more,

But in any environment Goldman Sachs thinks that it can make money.  The following is how Business Insider summarized the advice that Brazil gave in the report regarding how to make money off of the impending collapse in Europe….

• Buy a six-month put option on the Euro versus the Swiss Franc, thus betting the Euro will drop against the Franc (the Franc being the currency that an official Goldman report recently referred to as the most overvalued in the world)
• Buy a five-year credit default swap on an index of European corporate debt—the iTraxx 9. This is a bet that some of these companies will default, and your insurance policy, the CDS, will pay off

This is so typical of Goldman Sachs.  They will say one thing publicly and then turn around and do the total opposite privately.

For example, prior to the financial crisis of 2008, Goldman Sachs was putting together mortgage-backed securities that they knew were garbage and marketing them to investors as AAA-rated investments.  On top of that, Goldman then often privately bet against those exact same securities.

The CEO of Goldman Sachs has even acknowledged that the investment bank engaged in “improper” behavior during 2006 and 2007.

Now if you don’t understand what these financial instruments are (options, credit default swaps, etc.) it’s ok. What you need to take away from this is that the biggest baddest investment bank in the World is betting against our economy turning itself around. So, if you don’t believe me and think I’m just ranting, read the whole article, do a little research for yourself. No one is immune from what could potentially happen. Once again I hope I’m wrong and even though some of you will think I’m nuts, I can live with that if it means some of you will take some simple precautions “just in case”. Ok, enough said, the misses says I’m wasting my time as no one listens anyhow but I have to try.

Imagine if all your savings are instantly wiped out. Ok, that’s it, it’s now up to you to decide where we’re at for yourself.

Mom’s now in the shower and I’m right behind her. It’s time to wake the boys and get the day started. We hope everyone had a great weekend and is doing well. The cooler weather and along with it, the snow is coming. You can see the first leaves starting to fall here in Colorado and it’ll be the middle of winter before you know it. Take care, God Bless and have a great day.

First off today is post #250. Our first post was December 31st so that means tomorrow is the 250th day out of 365 this year! Wow, only 115 days left if my math is correct.

Yesterday we headed up to Boulder to my close friend Brad’s home to visit, see their new house and let the kids play. Brad and Carol have been our oldest friends since we’ve been in Colorado. He’s an accomplished chef that owns a couple of restaurants who I first met when we started our wine company. They used to live in a small house up in Eldorado Canyon (famous for it’s rock climbing) but recently moved to a new home (new to them) in north Boulder. We’ve been invited numerous times but never made it up so finally we loaded up and off we went. Upon arrival it took us a minute to find the entrance as the home is surrounded by an 8 foot adobe wall. You walk through a little courtyard into an expansive older mexican style home with about 3 additional little buildings. The floor plan was very open with lots of room to get away from each other, the misses and I are so ready to move. If it wasn’t for Grandma being so close, we’d start looking now. Actually our dream house is Grandma’s house but she won’t let us move in. Maybe one day we’ll be lucky enough to live there! The yard itself was huge with a small stream running through it, a couple of ponds and plenty of room to roam. They have a huge garden in one corner next to the chicken coop. Squash, tomato’s lots of different kinds of lettuce, green beans, strawberries and more were everywhere. The misses and I were in heaven. They have 3 chickens which roam the yard most of the time and were quite gentle as the boys were chasing, catching and holding them all afternoon. Their names were Squishy, Sunset and Fluffy. Brad and Carol (after numerous in vitro attempts) finally had twins that are now 7 years old. Our kids have known their kids for their whole lives as we get together often over the years, however this was the first time they actually were in a setting where they could all play together for a whole day. The kids all got along perfectly. Chasing chickens, making impromptu fishing poles to use in the pond), catching crawdads, jumping on the in ground trampoline and more consumed their day. While all this was going on, Brad, the misses and I grabbed a bunch of fresh veggies from the garden and cooked up a hodge podge of carrots, onions, green beans, corn, tomato’s, and lots of other stuff I can’t remember. We then mixed in some gluten free noodles and after 2 hours of all three of us cooking, had a great super healthy lunch that even the kids ate.

Halfway through our preparation, Carol (who was out of town) parent’s showed up to return a trailer. Brad invited them to stay for lunch with us and they did. The funniest moment of the day was when our little guy came in and saw Carol’s Mom outside through the window cleaning all the tables and chairs to get ready for lunch. He walked straight up to Brad and said “you have an awesome butler”. We all burst into laughter and Brad told our little guy he was right. After lunch we pulled out Coulter’s (or more like Brad’s) new toy, a small dirt bike or motorcycle. We geared each boy up in boots , pads and helmets and let them ride around the back yard. They’ve only had this for a few weeks and Brad confided he bought it on a whim. His son did pretty well once he got going but our oldest having never been on a motorcycle was cruising around the yard from the minute he jumped on. Our little guy was up next and did great with me running along side holding on so he wouldn’t tip over. Needless to say the entire ride home was filled with questions like “can we get motorcycles?”. The good thing here was it was a bike for riding in the dirt, not on the street, and we’re coming into winter so no need to worry about this until next Spring.

6 hours zipped by and we headed home around 5pm after a fun filled day. Like I said earlier, the kids played great together which was a great test as we’re all planning on going to Italy together sometime between now and November. 4 adults and 4 kids, it’ll be quite a group. This is made possible due to me selling Brad’s restaurants 250 ($35,000) cases of wine from Umbria and getting the Italian government to pick up 75% of the tab. We figure it’ll cost each of us about $2000 for a complete 10 day trip for each family. This includes air fare, lodging, meals, rental cars, the whole thing. $500 per person or $50 per day ($12.50 per person!) is too good of a deal to pass up. The misses and I are trying to figure out how to come up with the cash to go. Good Christmas idea if anyone’s wondering what to get us!

We arrived home around 5:30 and the boys hit their bikes and played in the neighborhood until I pulled them in at 8pm. They capped off the day with a marsh mellow roast at the neighbor’s. Each boy and I had to carve their roasting stick and I carefully supervised each of them carving their stick with a knife. They were beat by the end of the day and we all slept until 7am.

I have a few calls this morning (yes I know it’s supposed to be a holiday but I’m self employed) and we’re going to try to go to the gym and then I think Grandma is buying the stuff for the misses to make lasagna for dinner for all. It’s still cool, about 75 degrees during the day which is just perfect. I need to run now and get started on my day but here’s a quote to ponder,

“The vice of capitalism is it’s unequal sharing of blessings. The Virtue of Socialism is it’s equal sharing of misery.” – Winston Churchill

Now if you think about this, first off, Winston Churchill was a pretty smart guy (we need an inspiring President like him!) and second, this is why some people are rich and some are not. Even though I’m not one of the rich, I like knowing the opportunity is there. I do agree some loopholes need to be closed and am kind of in the middle on the political spectrum but socialism, which is where Obama is headed, is not the answer. Ok ,that’s it for the day, no more politics on the holiday.

Take care, God Bless and give us a call.

Finally some relief from the heat. Yesterday it was about 75 degrees at the peak of the day and in the low 60’s in the morning and evening, just about perfect. This morning at 5am it’s 41 degrees! I just opened the windows to let the fresh air in. For most of the morning, I had the basement windows open and the attic fan going. It seems we might have some sort of sewer problem as we were getting a foul smell coming from down there. Upon investigation (the misses and I searching around the basement with our noses) we finally found a 1 inch copper drain pipe that comes down from upstairs and goes straight into the concrete in the basement floor. The problem was that about a foot up from the floor there’s a T joint and it’s not capped. We figured out this is where the smell was coming from. After a call to Bob the Plumber (who is out of town) we duct taped the hole off until next week. This seemed to eliminate the sewer gas smell but obviously something is wrong. We’re praying that our basement doesn’t have to be dug out. Nothing is plugged (toilets or sinks) so it might just be gas coming up from the ground but I think there has to be some leak somewhere for the smell to exist at all. Our house was built in 1967 and were on bentonite (soil that moves a lot) so I’m sure there’s some break somewhere in the line below the house. Could be a huge job with jackhammers digging up concrete and all, let’s hope for the best. Anyhow after taping up the open hole in the pipe and running the attic fan, the smell is thankfully gone. Maybe we should just leave it as is, don’t tell anybody, and move!

At 8:30 yesterday morning I received a call from our friends the Harris’s. Carrie called and asked if I could come over and help Mark move a couple of trees for 30 minutes. Being the nice guy that I am, I said sure. I loaded up both boys and headed over about 9am. When I arrived I was astonished to find a full trailer of 9 or 10, 15 to 20 foot tall trees that had root balls weighing over 400 pounds each! He had managed to get one into a wheelbarrow but we couldn’t move it. So we jumped in my truck (his had the trailer of trees attached) and drove off to find a “tree cart” at a rental place. We had to go to two places before we found one for rent and finally made it back. (we’ve already been gone more than 45 minutes and had yet to move a tree!) We unloaded the cart and began to move these 400+ pound bundles of dirt and leaves. His yard is not yet landscaped so we had to pull these over loose dirt and up a hill which made things even more difficult. Now I’m pretty strong and Mark’s a big guy too but we had to go about 5 feet at a time and then stop for a rest. This went on for about an hour and we had 6 of the 9 trees moved. On every pull I could feel my back getting tighter and tighter. When we got to the last three trees, it was apparent we couldn’t move these alone. Mark called another friend of ours who showed up but it was too late for my back. After standing around for 20 more minutes, my back had tightened up and I knew one more pull could really throw it out. So I at this point (2 hours later) had to bag out. I got home, hit the showers (again) as I was dripping with sweat and began to ice my back. Not a good sign with the 3 day weekend just beginning. This morning I’m stiff and sore but thankfully not hunched over, yet! I’m taking 3 advil at a time trying to fight it off, hope it works. The oldest asked “how come when Mark comes over and helps you move wine you pay him but when you go over and move trees he doesn’t pay you?” Good question but it is different. Mark would help me move wine for free but I always offer some free wine up front, but from a 9 year old, good question!

Now to the boys, they of course were playing up and down the street all day long. The misses took them for some errands and a pizza while I went over to the neighbor’s to discuss some business. (more on that later this year) All this time the green chili was cooking away and we decided to invite L.O.L. up for dinner so she wouldn’t be all alone. She’s so cute as she showed up (the misses picked her up) dressed to the nine’s (or whatever they say). She loves the boys and keeps telling us how great they are and thanked us over and over for the invite. It must be hard being 90 and alone. Anyhow, she’s a pretty easy guest and I spent most of the time outside monitoring the boys going up and down the street on their bikes. (this means watching for cars and then yelling “car” whenever one is coming to get all the kids to the side of the road) The rest of the night was movie night with the four of us in our bed watching tv. Finally at almost 10pm we sent the boys to bed. Somehow when I woke up this morning, the little guy was back in our bed! Now he is sleeping most of the time in his own bed but manages to magically work his way back into our bed during the night. We call him the human heating pad.

Today we might try to go fishing somewhere or just hang out around the house. The kids prefer to play with their friends until they have their friends go inside and then it’s “we never do anything”. We’ll see how the morning plays out.

Not much to talk about politics wise but check this out just for fun, there’s a lot of talk about jobs right now and this is pretty funny.
Not all jobs
are suffering under Obama –

1. Crack Sales are way up

2. Squatters are up 75%

3. Flash mobs are up 300%

4. Those who give out welfare checks and food
stamps are up 450%

5. Those that board up vacant homes and stores are
up 1000%

How’s that for ya! It’s funny but it’s not because it’s true. I won’t go much further but there is more pain coming before things get better. Many noted economists say the market could really crash hard in the next 60 days, get ready now just in case. Ok I’ll stop now, I need to come up with some acronym for all that’s happening. Maybe we should have a contest. One of the more famous blogs out there has a saying that is “when the Shumer hits the fan”. This of course is named after Chuck Shumer, the loser senator from New York. I think we all know what word “Shumer” is replacing. So, I’m looking for suggestions for our own word to describe our current situation, let me know what you have. How about something like, oh I don’t know, Frustression, you know a mix between recession and frustration. Anyhow let me know what you have, of course Obama’s would be something like, “lil’bump” for a little bump in the road. Ok ok I’ll stop but you get the point. One more little fact just to put it all into perspective,

US economy created no job growth in August, data show: First time since 1945 that government has reported net monthly job change of zero

WOW, not good news, how can this be? In 1945 World War II was just ending so this was understandable then but now? Come on, not a good sign. I wasn’t around in 1945 so I don’t know how the economy was, if anyone remembers, let me know.
Anyhow have a great day, winter’s coming, pray we don’t have a huge sewer problem and God Bless,

Here we go, 3 days off and well deserved for all of us in our brood. The misses has been working very hard at work and at home, and the boys have been doing great at school and adjusting well. They deserve a break and it’s now up to me to find something fun for them to do rather than just sit around all weekend.

The house is clean and it’s finally getting cool outside. It’ll be in the mid 70’s or 80’s today. Wherever it is, it’ll be a lot more enjoyable than the 90 degree plus weather that’s been plaguing us for months. I meant to get both dogs groomed but didn’t get around to it. That’ll have to wait until next week.

The boys played hard after school until around 7:30 when I forced them to come in for a shower and a movie. The activities included baseball, bike riding, scooter riding (a small 2 wheeled scooter called a Razor that all the kids have) and general horse play. Our kids sure are well adjusted when you compare them to the rest of the neighborhood boys and girls. There’s lot’s of drama always going on with someone not happy about something. Thankfully it’s usually not our kids. Before we came home from school, we went to the library for the annual Book Fair. This is a fund raiser where the school sells books (for a lot more than the book store) over the course of a week. You always have to limit their choices or it’d cost you over a hundred dollars. I managed to get out of there for $26 bucks. The kids were going to use their own money (and I probably should have let them) but they both worked so hard all week and aced their spelling tests, so I decided to pick up the tab and let them save their $7 weekly allowance for something else. We’re very proud of both of them and you all should be too!

It’s a little after 5am and of course everyone is still sleeping. I think we’ll make some green chili today because the hatch green chili’s just arrived from New Mexico. For those of you that don’t know, this is an annual event that those of us in the know wait for! Hatch Green chili’s are a special chili pepper that comes around about this time every year. On street corners you see stands pop up everywhere with big wire drums (like a bingo thing) connected to a propane torch that are used to roast the chili’s to order. You can buy these by the bushel (or smaller) and you then freeze them and use them over the course of the year. There’s a mexican guy named Carlos at the misses work who I ran into at another store the other day. It seems he goes around from store to store roasting chili’s for Whole Foods because he’s apparently the resident expert. He recognized me and told me to wait a day and he’d roast me up a special batch that he’d bring to her store the next day. When I picked them up he said this was a mild batch and in a few days he’d have a bunch of “hot”peppers roasted up for me too. Turns out he also made some green chili salsa that’s to die for. So, we’re having green chili tonight!

We were at her store picking up a huge cardboard box that was used to hold watermelons. In fact, the misses had to take the watermelons out of the box to take it home. You see she’s in charge (with two other girls) of the school dance this year. It’s coming up fast and this years theme is pirates. Now if you don’t already know this, the misses lives for putting on theme parties. Give her any theme and then just get out of the way. Hence here at home we have a full size ships mast in the kitchen she made out of some bamboo poles complete with sails (with old curtains from the thrift store) complete with a crows nest, a bunch of pirate flags (she traced and then drew on the skull and bones on old sheets she scrounged up) and the box I think that is going to be a replica of a pirate ship. I think the “ship” is for the photo booth. She’s very creative and really has a lot of fun doing this. She’s always been a big help to the school in general (remember the smart board last year?) and to both boys classes individually. If 1/10th of the parents out there would put in half the effort the misses does, the school would be a much better place, have no funding problems and all the kids would get a better education. That may seem like a big statement  but it’s 100% accurate, she really does a lot and gets little to no credit. Of course she doesn’t do it for the credit but she sure deserves it.

I think I’ll skip politics today (sorry Uncle T) due to the holiday weekend. Hopefully the newspaper is here or else I’ll head to the gym. It’s about 5:30 now and no one will be up for at least an hour and a half. Here’s a fun read below but don’t fret, it has nothing at all to do with politics.

Dan was a single guy living at home with his father and working in the family business.

When he found out he was going to inherit a fortune when his sickly father died, he decided he needed to find a wife with whom to share his fortune.
One evening, at an investment meeting, he spotted the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Her natural beauty took his breath away.”I may look like just an ordinary guy,” he said to her,
“But in just a few years my father will die and I will inherit $200 million”.
“Impressed, the woman asked for his business card and three days later, she became his stepmother.

Women are so much better at financial planning than men.

How’s that for ya! Pretty funny. Oh well, have a great weekend and take care of yourselves. We should be around home but might head out for a quick fishing trip to the mountains. A couple of more things, gold is up to $1885 an ounce, wow, and we’re looking for a cheap 1970 or earlier 4 wheel drive truck. This will be like a ranch truck. We have a young couple who are friends who are looking for something like this. They live in a little town in Wyoming so their choices are limited. If any of you old people out there (sorry but I have to say that while I still can before I’m one of you) know anyone with a nice old, preferably 4 wheel drive, truck, please let us know. Thanks much, be safe and God Bless.

It’s 4am and I just woke up due to the misses talking (more like blurting out loudly) in her sleep. She said something like “this is horrible, this is the worst time ever”. I woke her up and asked her if she was ok and she said she was dreaming that she was at the worst gym ever and couldn’t use any of the machines because it was too crowded. This is somewhat of a relief as usually she has bad dreams. Being at an over crowded gym isn’t all that bad in the grand scheme of things.

She’s had a rough few days with a migraine headache for 2 days now. I asked her how her head was when I woke her and she said “pounding”. The misses thinks we have water leaking in somewhere in the house and thinks it smells every time she goes into the basement, sure hope she’s wrong. We both have had headaches over the past couple of days and the only thing we can think of that’s different is that she cleaned the house with this new cleaning solution. So yesterday she came home from work with a bunch of new “green” cleaners that are natural and don’t have the chemicals most stuff does. I’m ok with this as who knows what’s in some cleaner made in Mexico. Sure the green stuff costs a little bit more but if it means we’re not cleaning with formaldehyde or some cancer causing stuff, it’s worth it. I won’t go into a rant here but once again the almighty dollar and pursuit of profits trumps peoples best interests. There are tons of products, take medicine as an example, where we’re told it’s good for us only to find out later that it causes some deadly disease. You just can’t trust much anymore. It used to be that you could buy your food or clothes or medicines and trust in their quality. You didn’t have to worry about some bad side effect like radiation or pesticides on your food or lead in your clothes and don’t even get me started on medicines. The big drug companies are all about profits, they really don’t care about curing people if you think about it. Ok ok I’ll stop, back to the family.

After Mom got home I was still working and the little guy had soccer practice coming up. It was 95 degrees and before practice he needed to get some new cleats and shin guards (which are mandatory) because his old ones no longer fit. There goes another $60 we weren’t planning on. In addition our truck had an engine malfunction light that came on yesterday so off it goes to the shop today. Thankfully it’s under warranty. Our other car which just came back from the shop has some thumping sound coming from somewhere on the side that was fixed. It seems nobody can do things right the first time these days.

Both boys have spelling tests today, the first of the year. They both have been doing their homework every day, the little one reluctantly. They seem all ready as they had Mom quiz them right before going to sleep last night. The oldest is really focused on school and getting 100% which he usually does. If he gets even 1 word or 1 math problem wrong, he’s really upset. The few times he does, it’s usually something simple just from him working too fast. I can really identify with this as I do the same thing. I think our brains work faster than we can write.

We’re still looking for something to do this weekend. I think we’re staying in town instead of fighting the crowds and heading to the mountains. It’ll also save us a bunch of money if we just stay close to home. As I said earlier, it’s still hot which is getting pretty old. It’s supposed to be in the 80’s this weekend which will be a nice break but we’re all looking forward to snow. We’d better be careful what we wish for!

It’s now almost 5m and I’m headed to the gym before everyone gets up for the day. I’m still adding up all the numbers but it looks like I pretty much am going to come in where I want for the month of August. This is huge for the company as it save us probably $20,000 in bank fees by hitting our covenants. No politics today, consider it my gift to you for the holiday weekend. Instead I’ll leave you with a quote for the day, read it carefully and then decide, which one are you?

“Political tags, such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth, are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.” – Robert A. Heinlein

Don’t know about you, but I have no such desire!

Take care and God Bless,

Where does the time go, we’re now 2/3rd’s of the way through the year and before we know it, we’ll be starring down 2012. Mom spent most of the day cleaning the house from top to bottom. She even tackled the mud room which tends to collect piles of shoes and coats. I went grocery shopping and came home with lots of basic staples like pasta, risotto, lentils and soups. They had a bunch of stuff on sale and I decided to take advantage of the savings while we could. Today the misses works from 7:15 until 3pm so she’s already up getting ready for the day. She’ll then be off until next Tuesday so that means 4 days off! I’ll be in charge of getting the boys dressed and fed and delivered to school. I did manage to get them both to take their showers last night after a few hours of riding scooters in the 97 degree heat.

We picked them up at 2:45 and headed home to get started on their homework. The oldest dives right in but the little guy still puts up a fight telling us things like “none of the other kids are doing their sentences”. It’s pretty easy to see through his objections but sometimes comical when you hear the things he comes up with. The other day he said something about the Playboy Club. I don’t remember the details of the comment so I’ll ask the misses when she comes down. The point is, how would he even know what the Playboy Club is? There are previews for a new show by that name coming this fall so that must be it. I asked the oldest one if 4th graders like girls yet and he said “I don’t know”. Now this is a far cry for earlier responses such as “no way” or “ick”. Seems like the boys are growing up. I asked as we saw him walking with a girl named Morgan who was in his 3rd grade class and kindergarten. She always seemed like a nice girl but the misses calls her a “fashionista” and says she’ll be wanting Manolo Blancik shoes by the time she’s in High School. (don’t tell the anyone the misses has a few pair of these italian shoes as she would hate to be known as a fashionista!) Anyhow he said they were just talking about their teachers but last year the boys wouldn’t even be seen talking to girls. He’s always been the one the girls like in school. Last year when his friends were all acting goofy trying to get the attention of a girl who’s been his good friend and classmate for years (Jennifer), she just ignored them like they were little kids and would hang out with the oldest. You can imagine how this frustrated all the boys with raging hormones. Both boys have always had the gift (or curse) of attracting the affection of the girls. The little one from kindergarten used to have to run away from this one little girl who would chase him all day trying to kiss him, it was pretty funny.

Yesterday the gang of four (our 2 boys and the neighbor’s 2 boys) hit their bikes hard and were cruising up and down the street like some sort of motorcycle gang. The oldest os the obvious leader of the pack barking out directions to the other three. Next in line of command is the little guy even though one of the neighbor boys is two years older. In a few years they’ll be extorting candy from all the houses on the street! (just kidding)  They’re very polite to all the people on the street and everyone enjoys our kids, especially the older folks whose kids are long gone.

Here comes Mom who has to leave in about 30 minutes and the little guy just walked in and grabbed the tv remote to put on some cartoons. He needs to read with me this morning or else we cannot sign off on his work sheet.

I’m pretty much done with work for the month of August with a few orders to wrap up. I think I’ll come in around $900K which is about $100K short of where I wanted to be but I can only do what I can do, meaning at some point, there’s nothing else I can do and it’ll be what it’ll be. I can’t stress about it anymore as there’s just some things I cannot control. The stress I already have on a regular basis would kill the average person within hours! I’ve just conditioned myself over the years to handle high stress situations. I sometimes even amaze myself how I can just take things in stride, I suppose it’s a gift!

Well, no politics today since I gave you all an extra long read yesterday. Hope you’re all doing well and have some fun plans for the last big weekend of summer. Oh, Grandpa Bob went to the cardiologist yesterday and we’re happy to report that he’s just fine. Apparently the scare he had a few weeks ago (when we had to rush off to California) was a false alarm. Better safe than sorry. Did you see Dick Cheney has a new book out and is doing a media tour on all the shows? Don’t say anything to anyone but I think I’ll get Grandma Dixie one for Christmas as I know she’s a big fan!

Take care, have a great day and God Bless.

Good morning. The Mister just left for the gym and the kiddos are still asleep. Bob and Fred (The beta fish) are still with us…I think they have almost surpassed their life expectancy. This of course is a good thing, you see…in all my beta research….it seems they are very social fish…just not with each other.  It’s funny, but they actually come to the front of their bowls, flare their gills and make eye contact each morning….or whenever someone stops to say “Hello” to them.We hope they make it another year.

The boys had another good day at school. I am amazed at the amount of 4th grade homework.  The spelling list came home yesterday…20 words that first have to be alphabetized and then re-written in cursive and in alphabetical order. Our 4th grader has really beautiful cursive and whipped through the list with a minimal amount of complaining. After homework the boys were off to ride scooters.  They both have figured out how to make the scooters jump while riding. The youngest caught a lot of air and would land the scooter with one leg on and one off.  They were also riding quite fast and we (Hubby and I) were trying to micro-manage the boys speed on the scooters to no avail. The oldest came in on his own during all of the fun to set the kitchen timer, grab his book and let me know it was time for his 35 minutes of reading homework.  Wow…was I ever impressed with his show of responsibility…..It has to be a hard choice…..ride with all of the neighbor kids…or come in and read for 35 minutes.  We did not even mention anything to him…he just made the choice on his own.  What a good kid.

Today is a “Clean up the clutter day”. I don’t know how this house can accumulate so much ‘Stuff” on every bare surface we have…..tables, counters, floors, chairs…unbelievable….I am starting with the mud room and working my way up…wish me luck because I am very good at procrastinating… and with a pirate themed dance for the kid’s school coming up Sept. 16th I could easily become distracted for something much more fun.

I am one of the “Chairs” for the dance along with two of my good friends. I am working on the decorations…Hurray…..it is kind of like building a stage set since we decorate the gym and the cafeteria. It’s a big space, but I have some really fun ideas.  More on that later.

Time to get the boys up…I’ll sign off…Hubby should be here in a moment to offer a “Political view” on the day.

God Bless…llf

Side note….I got hair extensions put in my hair and I finally have the lovely locks that I was intended to have. I love them, but if they look fake to those of you who know and love me…please tell me…you won’t hurt my feelings.

First off, her hair doesn’t look fake at all, in fact, she looks much younger and I catch myself doing a double take every so often. We didn’t make it to the Children’s Hospital event last night as the misses had a stomach ache. We had run up to Vail to do some paperwork while the boys were in school and by the time we got home, she wasn’t feeling well. She would have rallied but I told her not to worry about it, we’ll just go to the big gala in September. I’m reluctant to dive into politics as I don’t want to offend anyone but I was told the 1 person I might offend just skips over the political part anyhow. So, here goes, check this out. It’s kind of long but a good read because it’s from a liberal democrat and is all true! Read on if you dare! I’ll let the article speak for itself, take care, God Bless and have a great day, the boys and I are going to have breakfast now and then it’s off to school.

Well I don’t know if any of you noticed, but we had one comment yesterday from a loyal reader, family member and Uncle. In case you missed it, here it is.

Hey, your ruining the blog! I look forward to the ranting and raving over politics. Please continue with them it makes for good conversation and opens people’s eyes to what is really going on. Just one guys opinion!

Now in the interest of maintaining the small readership I have, I feel it is my duty to jump back into politics. I’m sorry if I offend anyone but I cannot afford to lose such a brilliant reader as Uncle T who posted the above comment. I will do my best to include information about the boys activities (as that’s why most of you read) but I’ll be writing about politics first so you’ll have to read the whole post!

So here we go, yesterday I was reading the Chicago Tribune and stumbled upon an article which talks about how the current White House is trying to blame the poor economy and everything else on a series of natural disasters. I won’t print the whole article but it’s safe to say (from reading the whole article) that looking back at previous administrations, they all faced these type of issues just like the current President does now. I think what’s important to note is that this President has been given a “free pass” for many of the failures of his policies or Obamanomics. Read on,

That’s a mighty wind blowing from the east. No, I’m not talking about Hurricane Irene. It’s the blustery gusts stirred up long before Irene by the constant whining from the Obama White House: Everything but the administration’s own policies are responsible for the faltering economy.

Irene is only the latest of the “head winds” White House officials blame for feeble economic growth and persistent high unemployment. There was the earthquake/tsunami in Japan, the fiscal crisis in Greece, the civil war in Libya on top of Arab Spring uprisings in other Arab countries and, of course, Republicans refusing to go along with President Barack Obama’s spending binge, er, “investments.” One adviser even found head winds from the East Coast earthquake, though its most notable damage appeared to be cracks in the foundation of the Washington Monument.

Now if you’re really honest and think about it, this is pretty much true. Everything you’ve heard from the White House are things like (from the Presidents own lips) “we were headed for a strong recovery and then we hit a few bumps in the road, like the earthquake in Japan, the Arab Spring and more”. Now I don’t know about you but I really don’t think any of our leaders deserve a “free pass” from issues going on in other parts of the World. All Presidents have faced issues like these and some worse. What about the earthquake in Haiti or the tsunami in Thailand or 20 years ago the war in Bosnia and Serbia? I could go on and on but I don’t remember any President, democrat or republican using these type of world events or natural disasters as excuses for problems here at home. I’d better get off this subject now but you get my point. Wasn’t it Harry Truman that said “the buck stops here”? Well, it’s just too bad our President doesn’t take some responsibility for the mess we’re in. I think if he did, a lot more people would understand. If you look back at what he promised all of us to get elected, apparently it was all just talk as he’s done nothing he said he would, it’s really pretty sad. We were all duped by this slick talking man whose promises we all believed. Some still do! You know the old saying, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Somehow I don’t think, no matter who the republican nominee (unless it’s Palin or Bachmann, god help us), the American people will be fooled again.

Alright, let’s talk about the boys and their day. As you know, Mom worked until 3pm so I picked the boys up from school. They were both in good spirits and I was surprised the oldest didn’t call during the day (due to his cold) wanting to come home. Both boys were given supreme compliments from their teachers yesterday. Turns out the little guy was told he’s the best reader in the whole class! Next the oldest one was told he is the best at division and multiplication in his class! Now we know their brilliant (just look at their parents) but this is quite a feat for both! The little guy really is reading well and we’ve been working with him a lot at home and the oldest just has that “numbers type” brain like me. He just see’s the numbers in his head, it’s kind of a natural thing that comes easy for him like it does for me.

We beat Mom home by about 10 minutes and started our homework. In 4th grade, they’ve really stepped it up a bit. The oldest now has to read for at least 30 minutes without stopping. He’s finally getting to that point where he wants to read rather than being forced to. The little guy seems to be following in his brothers footsteps too. He loves “Dairy of a Wimpy Kid”. This is a series of about 5 books and a few movies that were all the rage last year. Prior to going to bed (and after a bunch of bike riding outside) we played a few games of Go Fish. First it was Mom, the oldest and I, and then when the little guy came in, he took my place.

The oldest is up early with me and thankfully is feeling a bit better. It seems we might have dogged a bullet as far as the whole family getting sick. He’s now making some breakfast for himself which is pretty dangerous as I’m sure it includes some donuts from the freezer. At least they’re healthy (if donuts can be healthy) as they came from Whole Foods. I think they’re gluten free and have no bad chemicals in them. I hear the microwave going now so yup, that’s what he’s up to. I just asked him what he’s having with the donut and he replied “toast, Gorilla Munch (a cereal) and some bacon probably”.Well he is a growing boy. I’m sure by Christmas he’ll be taller than most of you reading, especially anyone of you referred to as “Grandma”. Watch out as the little guy is right behind him and also going through a growth spurt.

Time to run as Mom is already in the shower and I too need to get moving. I was hoping to get to the gym but it looks like that’ll have to wait until tomorrow. The oldest just asked me if I liked burnt toast? I of course said yes. He said great as he accidentally burnt it so he’s now putting a little butter on it for me and making himself some more. Wow, it’s really burnt, black as the night, but I’ll eat it because he made it for me, even if by default.

I need to get a drink to wash this down so time to run. Thanks for reading through the politics today. I know some of you don’t subscribe to my views but that’s just too bad as I’m the author, ha ha. Just kidding, (kind of), I’ll try to take it easy but everyone in Washington is already in campaign mode and the election is still 14 months away, it’s only going to get worse, much worse! We’re all going to be so sick of politics by November 2012 we won’t know what to do, so hold onto your hats. You can think of this as a “warmup” for what’s to come.

Take care, the little guy is up now too and says hi, have a great day and God Bless,

Been up since 4am but our internet was down so I’ve been on the phone with Comcast getting it re-set. It’s now 5 and I just woke the misses as she works at 7:15. This of course means I’ll be making breakfast and getting the boys off to school. The little one seems to be getting better but now (of course) the oldest has a severely stuffed nose.

Yesterday was a fun filled busy day. Before I get into that, I need to point out that Grandma Dixie replied to yesterday’s post about the num chucks. According to her, the chain was metal (could have been, I don’t remember) and this was in fact a dangerous weapon. Maybe us as parents have become desensitized to how dangerous some of the toys for sale these days really are. Anyhow, I promised not to go out and buy him another set and we’ll trust her judgement that we shouldn’t let the oldest have them. After all, she’s been around a little bit longer than us.

To yesterday, I started the day off with a trip to the gym and Mom worked out down in the basement on our exercise machine. We then got all geared up on our bikes and headed down to the street where the pro cycling riders would soon be zipping by. A few minutes after we arrived to one of the few shady spots we could find, the endless procession of official vehicles and police cars and motorcycles came zooming by. All the side streets were closed so no one could get onto the race course and helicopters were hovering overhead filming footage that was broadcast to over 60 countries. A group of people who lived at the house we were in front of came over to give the boys some thunder sticks (air filled long balloons provided by a sponsor company to smack together to make noise) and offered to let the boys stand on their yard to see better. Soon the photographers on motorcycles came speeding by so we knew the racers weren’t far behind. The peleton (the name for a group of riders) came racing down the hill. They were snaking from the left to the right side of the road all in a tightly nit group. The kids and everyone else lining the street were cheering and smacking their “thunder sticks” together making as much noise as they could while the peleton raced by. One of the riders threw his empty water bottle to the side of the rode to eliminate as much weight as possible. I quickly grabbed this and gave it to the oldest as he reluctantly gave up one of his thunder sticks earlier to our little 4 year old neighbor boy. About 20 seconds separated 3 groups of riders and then it was all over. It was very cool and you felt like you were in Europe. This was a big deal for Colorado as it was the first time that the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners from the Tour de France competed in America at the same time. All the top riders in the World were here and we’re all glad we went down to see it.

Next I had to rush home for the Fantasy Football draft. On the way I came across a guy dragging his bike up the street due to his back tire locking up. I was right in front of our house so I offered to load up his bike and drive him home. he was very thankful. I then drove back down to the neighbors who gave the boys the thunder sticks and gave then a couple of bottles of wine. They were quite happy to see me! The football draft began at 1pm sharp with 12 guys from all around the country. This is the 15th year for our group although I’ve only been part of it for about 6 years. We all get on Skype (the free internet phone service where you can talk and see each other on video) to conduct the draft. This takes between 3 and 4 hours and by the end I was really thrilled with my team. The boys love it and help me choose the team (or guys) we play every week, it’s fun for all of us.

Speaking of the boys, they were playing outside for most of the day and finished up by watching a movie over at the neighbor kids house. We had spaghetti and garlic bread for dinner which was great. Everyone was tired and I think we were all asleep by about 9.

There’s three days left in the month and lots of purchase orders to collect. I hope the hurricane (tropical storm) doesn’t delay any revenue coming from the east coast. The flooding does look bad in certain states but thankfully the storm was not what the media had hoped for. All I can say is you’d better be prepared for a bad winter. I don’t know how “bad” it will be, but you should be ready for the worst. The newscasters are making fun of the storm on tv right now saying “what was all this fuss about” ? It’s hard to tell just what the weather will be so you need to be ready for the worst case scenario.

I’m going to abstain from politics again, aren’t you proud of me! I’m really trying hard to take a break from the endless bickering and lack of progress by our elected officials. Whoops, here I go, I’d better sign off now before I slip into a hole I can’t get out of without writing another 1000 words. So in closing, take care, have a great week, think about winterizing your car soon and God Bless,