A Year of Change

Ok, let’s say you live in New York and needed to get some food and water in case you’re without power for  a few days due to the storm. First let me say that the media over hypes everything and the supposed “hurricane” is no exception. Turns out the sustained winds are about 40 to 50 miles an hour tops with gusts to 75 or 80. Now this is still a big storm with lots of rain but it is not a hurricane! In fact it ceased to be a hurricane when it hit land in North Carolina. What it is is a good tropical storm. (Category 1 hurricane’s start with sustained winds of  about 80 miles and up) The storm is about to move out of New York and they say 70-80,000 people there are without power. Come on, we have more than this without power here in Colorado on a regular basis with a good rain! Now the point here is that thankfully it was not as bad as projected but there are a few important lessons for everyone to take away from this.

1. the media can and will over hype anything to get ratings, they’re still providing round the clock coverage and calling this tropical storm a hurricane! They keep showing the same pictures of a little flooding as they don’t have any real huge graphic damage to show us.

2. the general public believes everything they see on tv. These people are called “sheeple” meaning they follow media reports and each other like a herd of sheep. Overall they do not think for themselves but solely rely on the person on tv to tell them what to do.

3. The sheeple are not prepared and do not do so until the last minute. Home Depot and Wal Mart stores on the east coast have received a huge economic boost from everyone who was not prepared for even a few days without power.

4. When the unprepared get that mob mentality, they pick stores clean like, well see the photo below. I wonder how many people will try to return items when the storm passes?

A picture from a Queens supermarket taken minutes ago. You decide.

It’s hard to tell what this store has left but this was most likely the water or canned food aisle. I can only imagine the lines and pushing and shoving to get some of whatever was on these shelves yesterday. I’ll bet being in New York, the prices were up too! So, once again, better safe than sorry. The news is so starved for ratings that they’re now interviewing some guy named “Vinnie” on Fire Island (which was supposed to be wiped off the face of the earth!) in New York feeding him questions like “you said your girlfriend said maybe we should leave last night, didn’t she?” and Vinnie responds ” duh yea”. The reporter was clearly frustrated that he couldn’t get more drama out of Vinnie. Now I’m not trying to minimize the fact that it was a big storm and 9 people did die over the past 3 days due to falling trees or other tragedy. However I’d guess 9 people normally die from car accidents or other tragedy between North Carolina and New York in any given 3 day rain storm or period, you know, driving and sliding off the road or something. Anyhow, once again, everyone should have a little food and water, I’m just saying.

Ok, let’s talk about yesterday. The boys had fun playing all though we did keep the little one in trying to kick his cold. Mom had to run downtown to get her hair fixed while I cleaned up around the house. We had hamburgers and hot dogs for dinner and then watched the Bronco game on tv.

The oldest one had been bugging me to call Grandma Dixie and have her send his num chucks (a plastic toy we bought at a costume shop in Sacramento) as he needs them for his Halloween costume. When we called Grandma she said that that toy was lethal and she couldn’t believe we bought it! When we left her house, she said she was sitting on it so we wouldn’t see it so we couldn’t take it with us. Now I applaud Grandma looking out for the boys best interests but this was just a toy with plastic chains holding it together. The oldest is going to be crushed when I tell him it’s not coming. You see Grandma said she tried to break it and couldn’t, so then used “bolt cutters” to take it apart (after she and Pa Don put it around each others neck) to destroy it and then threw it away. She also told the misses that “we had no business buying that toy!”. I guess the misses promised that we wouldn’t go buy another one so hopefully the oldest will forget about it and decide to choose something else for his costume. I had the misses ask if Grandma would be upset if I put this in the post and she said, “go ahead, if you want to admit you bought that”. Oh well, at least she cares!

This morning we have to get ready to head down to to watch the pro cycling race zoom by us on the way to the finish in downtown Denver. This race has the top riders from all over the World and has been going on for about a week. Then we have our fantasy football draft at 1pm. This usually takes about 4 hours to complete and the boys love it and want to be part of it. I need to head to the gym for a quick workout and I think I’m getting arthritis in my right hand. Hard to believe a 30 year old like me can get arthritis!

Hope you’re all doing well, send a comment, no politics again, aren’t you proud of me! Don’t worry, I’ll jump back in tomorrow as you can bet some politician will get on tv and say or do something really stupid. Without them the late night talk show hosts would have no material! So, take care and God Bless, until tomorrow…

First off, today is post number 240 meaning there’s 125 days left in the year. Pretty soon it’ll be Christmas, time to start thinking about what you want from Santa!

Now onto lobster fest, about 3pm yesterday Fed Ex showed up with a box full of four 2 lb+ plus live lobsters. According to the enclosed paperwork, they were pulled out of the ocean the same day they were shipped. We borrowed a giant pot from Uncle T and proceeded to cook them up. We of course humanely dispatched them before putting them in the water so they didn’t suffer. After about 16 minutes, we had fresh, great tasting lobster. We gave one to Uncle T and Aunt B who said their’s was rubbery but our’s were great! Maybe the trip in tin foil to their house kept that one cooking or something. Anyhow we loved ours with the oldest chowing down a bunch. I decided I’m going to reciprocate and send some Colorado buffalo to my friend in NY.

Speaking of New York, it looks like the hurricane is headed their way. Luisa (my pseudo little sister) who lives in Virginia was telling me of all the lines for gas and to get into stores like Wal Mart to buy supplies. I guess there were even fights between people over trying to butt in line. I guess the shelves were picked clean with everything gone, not a single bottle of water or loaf of bread left. Guess most people waited until the last minute to prepare. Oh well, I think (hope) you got the point the other day, if you didn’t, you probably never will, until you experience this type of situation yourself.

The little guy stayed home with us yesterday and still had a bit of a fever around dinner time. I decided to run to the store and get some Children’s Tylenol. We can’t believe we didn’t have any as we try to keep this kind of thing around. This was a slip up on our part due to the recall of Tylenol earlier this year. It seems we never replaced our old medicine with the new version. He and Mom ares still sleeping and we’re hoping he feels better today. The boys, especially the older one, are lobbying hard to go to the pre-season football game tonight but it doesn’t start until 7pm and we really want the little guy to get better. I think I’ll call Uncle T and see if he knows anyone who wants the tickets.

Grandma went to dinner last night with Reverend Bob and his wife Jane. Bob is the man who married the misses and I, Uncle T and Aunt B and conducted the funeral for my dad. They’ve been close friends of our family for a long time. I’m glad she got out and hope she had a good time. It is still in the mid 90’s with no end in sight. Frankly it’s nice but we wish it’d just cool down about 15 degrees. I suppose we shouldn’t complain with everything that’s going on in other parts of the country.

The oldest and I are watching George of the Jungle. Anyone remember that from when you were younger, “George, George, George of the Jungle, friend to you and me!” I guess you need to music to have it make sense. Speaking of the oldest, he was riding the little guys bike yesterday and that bike doesn’t have gears like his. When he peddled backwards, much to his surprise, he was hitting the brakes and he and the bike did a flip. He skinned his knee up pretty good but it could have been much worse. Thankfully he was wearing his helmet. He’s pretty lucky as if he’s not zooming down the street on a skate board or a scooter, he’s on a bike and odds are sooner or later he’s going to have a spill. Once again he had a great day at school, he told us yesterday a lot of the kids act like little kids. I guess that’s cause they’re little kids, right? I asked him what he meant and he said some of them act like 3 year olds or baby’s. He’s growing up so fast, both boys are and for those of you that haven’t seen them in at least 3 days, they grew again! Yes they do grow that fast. The oldest has had a number of growing pains to go along with his growth spurt and yesterday had 5 pieces of toast, a bowl of cereal and a quart of milk for breakfast. He’s telling me he’s hungry now as well. I guess I’d better run and get him some food. No politics today, it’s too depressing and nothing’s really changed.

Ok, we expect everyone to have a good day and be thankful for what you have. Take care and enjoy life and we’ll talk to you tomorrow. God Bless,

I picked up the boys from school yesterday as Mom was still at work and the little guy told me he had to go to the clinic twice during the day as he wasn’t feeling well. They were both complaining of a bit of a sore throat in the morning before school. Right then I knew, oh oh, here it comes. You see when you take a few hundred kids and bring them all together after 3 months of summer, it’s like making a big soup with every germ imaginable. Every year right when school starts, kids get sick and this time it caught up with the little guy. His nose is so stuffed he can’t breath through it and he has that heavy cough that goes along with it. Thankfully he doesn’t have a fever but the runny nose and cough was enough to keep him up for most of the night, and us up for all of the night. The misses did take him into his room and went with him so I’d get some sleep but I know she got very little. Looks like he’ll be staying home today and hopefully this will pass quickly.

The oldest one had a good day and was finishing up a week long homework project which is a kind of big poster where he fills in various information about his summer and life. I forget what it’s called but I’m proud to say that one section is titled “My Hero” and he wrote in “My Dad”, or me! He has to put pictures in and then write in the various sections and I feel very honored that he chose me as his hero. Mom of course quipped that she does all the dirty work and of course I’m the hero! Of course she was just kidding as was also very happy he chose me.

Mom had to print some pictures for the poster and the one I took on the first day of school of the two boys is just priceless. I promise we’ll get some more printed and send you each one. I just had to change the channel as I’m getting so pissed off listening to some pundits that act like they’re talking for all of us which could not be further from the truth. I’m trying to stay away from all this crap today for you and I both. Hmmm, what else is going on, oh wait, I know , check this out! Yesterday a friend of mine that runs our distributor in New York City called me from Maine where he and his family are on summer vacation for a few weeks. He called to tell me that this morning I should be on the look out for a box from Fed Ex full of fresh live Maine lobsters! Whoo hoo, lobster, what a treat. I offered to pay for them but he said no way, it was his treat. It’s a good feeling to know that someone you know through work likes you enough personally to go out of his way while on family vacation and send you lobster! After all most business is all about personal relationships. I think this is one of the problems these days as there is little personal trust or relationships between people that do business together. It’s all about who can get the best price rather than who they are. For me, I’d rather pay a little more or get a little less and work with someone I know I can trust. It’s more important to me to know that they’ll do what they say and will listen if I ever have an issue or problem, rather than just getting the best price. I think back to when I was a kid, my dad was so liked, respected and trusted by everyone he did business with, in fact their whole circle of friends were all people he met and knew through work. If you think about it, so are mine as are most peoples. It’s kind of a big statement when someone you know through work sends you a gift with no strings attached. In any case, we’re getting lobster from Maine today! Whoo hoo!

It’s now 6am and I need to hit the gym. It’s still super hot here everyday. We just can’t seem to shake the mid 90’s but at least we’re not starring down at a hurricane. I hope everyone took a little bit away from the post the other day about getting prepared. I’ve been lobbying Grandma to pony up a few thousand dollars to let me buy some larger items I just can’ afford. I figured it out and I can pretty much come up with enough food to feed all of the family members here in Denver for a year for only about $5000. Now this might seem like a lot but think about what you spend on your insurance policies. We alone spend over that just in our household for medical, car and homeowners insurance and if something bad happens, none of those policies will be dropping of food or water at our front door! The say one of the worst potential consequences of the coming hurricane is that the ports might be damaged and then all the grocery stores will run out of food in a matter of days. In fact most are getting picked clean right now by the millions of people who have nothing ready rushing into store buying whatever is left on the shelves. Sorry if it seems like I’m beating a dead horse here but it’s no joke. Trust me, the government will not be there for you in any way shape or form if and when something bad happens. Ok ok, I’ll let it go know, just do me and yourself a favor an buy a  few extra cans of food each time you go grocery shopping. Enough said.

It sounds like the little one went back to sleep and so did Mom. In 10 minutes the oldest will be up getting ready for school. He says his new teacher is tough. I asked how he knew this and he said, “she told us”. Good for her. He also told us yesterday he had a different science teacher and after some questioning we found out he’s been put in an accelerated class. At least they’re “teaching up” as the misses puts it. He also was the only one to finish a complex math test and the teacher said to the class that “he sure loves math”. I think this week being the first, they’re doing a lot of testing and activities to see who knows what and who doesn’t. We know our guys will do fine as they’re extremely smart. (they get that from me, ha ha)

Ok time to run, hope everyone has some fun plans for the weekend. The boys and I have our fantasy football draft Sunday afternoon so we’ll be studying the next two days. Take care, stay safe and God Bless,

Ok, no earthquakes so far today, I hope I didn’t freak anybody out yesterday. The misses thought I was actually pretty reserved with everything going on these days.

Today the misses works at 7:15am so she’s up with me at 5am. I’ll be in charge of getting both boys ready and delivered to school. The youngest (as mentioned yesterday) brought his classmate home with him after school and having three boys here elevated the noise level by 10! It was so loud Mom had to load them up and take them all to the pool for an hour or so. She told me later that she was surprised that they didn’t ask them to leave because the boys were so loud. After we took the 3rd wheel home the boys rode bikes and played outside until bedtime at 8pm. We managed to pull them inside for a quick bite of dinner but then back outside they went.

I was up in Boulder for lunch with my long time friend Bradford who is a talented chef and owns a few restaurants. I think we all might be headed to Italy around the end of October or first of November. “All” means our family and his which means eight of us in total. (Brad, his wife and his two 8 year old kids and the four of us) This is all possible due to some EU (European Union) funds we get and Brad buying about 300 cases of wine from the region of Umbria. This opportunity came up yesterday when I came up short on selling the Umbrian wines in a pre sell and needed to put together a deal to sell them. We’ll keep you posted as we get closer.

Hurricane Irene looks like it could be a big one with at least a lot of rain. Let’s hope it’s not too bad. In order to spare you from politics today I’m signing off early. It’s almost September which is hard to believe, August just flew by. Here’s a quote for the day, hope you enjoy and God Bless,

“The true character of liberty is independence, maintained by force.” – Voltaire

Where were you yesterday when the earthquake hit. Now if you live in Colorado or on the east coast you might answer differently. It’s pretty odd that both Colorado and Virginia had earthquakes on the same day less than 6 hours apart. I called my Mom around 1pm and asked her if she heard about the earthquake and she said “well I was sleeping but I read about it in the blog”. I then said no Mom, the one on the east coast! She had not yet heard about this one but did ask “what’s going on with the world, it seems like it’s coming to an end”. I then pointed out how the word “prepare” is the most common word in the bible. (bet you didn’t know that!)  She said “what’s there to prepare for if no one’s around?”. Sorry Mom for sharing your thoughts with all but I think it’s important as a lot of people probably have the same questions or concerns. First of all, relax, the world is not coming to an end, life will go on. What is going to change is how your life goes on. Many things can (and will) happen such as the economy crashing, natural disasters, (earthquakes, solar storms, flooding, longer colder winters and hotter summers, etc.) increased conflicts (war), civil unrest (riots) and so on. This is nothing new, every generation faces challenges like these it’s just that now with our global society and the advancements in technology, we’ve made a lot of the potential problems potentially much worse. Granted we can’t as easily do much about the weather (except stop generating so much greenhouse gas and pollution) but we can easily directly impact war, the economy, food riots, etc. The problem is mankind is so short sighted that we don’t look at the needs of all of mankind, just our own. So, what do we do about it? First, you pray. Next, you do as the bible says and prepare for the worst and hope for the best. Now what does prepare mean? Well it has a different meaning, depending on who you are and how bad you think it’s going to get. We know two of you that have a “Ship’s Store” that could tide you over for a bit….

You all know that the misses and I probably “prepare” more than most. The main reason for this is we have kids. Also most everything we buy are items we’re going to use anyhow. If we buy extra food, we know we’ll eat it sometime. If we stock up on toilet paper, we know we’ll be using that too! When we buy bandaids in bulk, we for sure know we’ll use them with 2 boys! Others of you feel more secure in our infrastructure than we do which leads you to believe you don’t really need to prepare. I think some of you think no matter what happens, you’ll always be able to go down to the corner grocery store and pick up some meat, milk and bread. You think it might cost more but you’ll always be able to drive a few miles, walk into a store and buy whatever you want. Worst case, you think if you can’t, it’ll be only a small interruption, like a few days until the stores are once agin fully stocked. Frankly we think you’re dead wrong, but you all need to decide for yourselves.

For those of you that live close to us (Grandma, Uncle T, Aunt B, Aunt Shelly) you have an advantage over the rest of you because we try to buy extra supplies when we can knowing that most you don’t. However this doesn’t mean we have everything we need to take care of everyone (it just costs too much, if we had the money, we most certainly would!) for all the problems that could potentially be headed our way. So, we strongly suggest (and hope) that you at a minimum, go buy some extra food, get some bottled water and stock up our your medications. (we’ve been doing this for years and have managed to accumulate 6-9 months worth of extra medicine by refilling ours every 20 days instead of 30) Another easy but necessary habit to get into is, always keep your gas tank at least half full. We’ve now conditioned ourselves to consider the half way mark the same as empty. Whenever we’re getting close to that mark, we fill up. If you can do these few simple things, you’ll be ahead of most people. See this isn’t so scary, you don’t need to go out and buy any gas masks or military rifles, just get a little extra food and water. If you’d like any further suggestions, please feel free to ask us. I don’t think most of you will, but I feel it’s my duty to at least suggest that you take basic precautions to help you through potential troubled times. If you think about all that’s happening, troubled times are ahead. In closing, please don’t think we’re a bunch of survivalists…….. as nothing could be further from the truth. There’s a big misconception about anyone who takes any precautions to protect their family or loved ones from obvious things that appear to be headed our way. There are a lot (millions of people in the U.S.) of people that “prepare”. Many are your doctors, teachers, and friends, you just don’t know it. And what about the government?  The government is preparing like mad for every conceivable scenario like they’ve already run out of time! Here in Colorado they have created an underground compound topped with solar panels…we have been watching the non-stop construction for the last few years. Those of you that are older, remember back when you were a kid, I’ll bet your parents had months worth of canned foods and were prepared for all kinds of problems whether they needed to stitch up a pair of pants or stitch up a cut.

Speaking of labels, what about one Party labeling the Tea Party terrorists. Now I don’t consider myself a member of the Tea Party, but I think most of them are just regular people who are fed up with the runaway spending in Washington and the endless bickering among our self serving elected officials. (hmmm, maybe I am a member) Whatever you call them, they certainly are not terrorists. It’s really sad one group of Americans would label another group of Americans terrorists because they don’t agree with their politics. We’ve really come a long way people, nice. Another fine example of people working together.

Alright, I’ll try to skip politics tomorrow as I wrote so much today, thanks for sticking with me!

Ok, now to the day, Mom worked until 5pm and I picked the boys up at 2:45. We came home and all pitched in to clean up the house which was pretty much a mess. We stopped by Grandma’s around 4:45 on the way home from the bank. She was sitting outside on the phone. Both boys had another great day at school which is no surprise. They sure look good in their button down collared shirts. Everyone is still wearing shorts as it still hot with the temps in the mid 90’s. The little guy has a play date with his friend Scott after school today so we’ll be bringing 3 boys home. This for sure will make for some good stories tomorrow. I almost forgot, yesterday right before dinner, the little one came running in saying his brother just caught a big snake with his bare hands! Sure enough he had one by the tail and was holding it up for all to see. We made him walk down to the ditch and let it go. It wasn’t 5 minutes later and lo and behold, he had another one! The neighbor lady was thrilled as he was catching these in her yard and I think she feels the same about snakes as my Mom, iccckkk! We then all sat down for dinner which was some leftover green chili on brown rice, it was really good. Both boys are still sleeping in their own bed (primarily meaning the little one here) and taking showers every morning! (That’s a big one) We’re also using the threat of taking away some of their allowance if they don’t eat all their breakfast which seems to be working too.

Mom’s going to walk the boys to school again today, we might as well let them do this while they can before the snow comes. We might try to get to the gym this morning but the phone’s already ringing off the hook and Mom I know wants to get cleaning.

Hope everyone is doing well and isn’t too put off by the start of today’s post. I figured with the earthquakes, no better time to share my thoughts on preperation. Here’s a quote for the day, take care and God Bless,

“In the age of lies, even the clumsiest frankness is preferable to the best-orchestrated ruse.”

School was great according to the boys who both had a great day. Mom walked with them yesterday morning as they were ready so early and wanted to get some exercise. We picked them up at 2:45 and took them for some ice cream to celebrate. The day was filled with a bunch of phone calls for me and some laundry and house cleaning for the misses.

Today the misses works from 8 until 5 so I’ll be driving both boys to and from school. I’ve got some real radical plans in store for work over the next few weeks as I’m planning on clearing out over a million dollars worth of inventory at reduced prices. I’m installing some pretty aggressive tactics and changes to the way we do things due to the ever changing economy. Someone has to do it and it looks like I’m the only one in the company thinking out of the box right now.

We had the largest earthquake to hit Colorado in over 40 years last night. It was a 5.3 quake southwest of Trinidad which is about 180 miles from Denver. This is odd as we usually don’t get earthquakes around here. They say all the seismic activity is due to events in the solar system. These reasons (without getting too technical) include gravitational pull due to planet alignment, and other forces that affect pressure on our planet. I guess they had about 4 smaller earthquakes in the hours before this hit. If this would have happened in California, things could have been much worse as the faults there are much more susceptible to large quakes. Thankfully it wasn’t worse. This all explains the bad dreams I had last night. I didn’t sleep very well and woke up twice. Both times the misses was up with leg cramps so I need to let her sleep as long as possible.

Rather than jump into politics I think I’ll go get some exercise in before everyone wakes up. Sorry for the short post today but I have a lot going on and am too tired to think of anything else to say. Hope you’re all doing well. Since I’m signing off early I think I’ll insert some reading for the day from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology).  Check this out and God Bless,

What causes riots? That’s not a question you would expect to have a simple answer.

But today, Marco Lagi and buddies at the New England Complex Systems Institute in Cambridge, say they’ve found a single factor that seems to trigger riots around the world.

This single factor is the price of food. Lagi and co say that when it rises above a certain threshold, social unrest sweeps the planet.

The evidence comes from two sources. The first is data gathered by the United Nations that plots the price of food against time, the so-called food price index of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN. The second is the date of riots around the world, whatever their cause. Both these sources are plotted on the same graph above.

This clearly seems to show that when the food price index rises above a certain threshold, the result is trouble around the world.

This isn’t rocket science. It stands to reason that people become desperate when food is unobtainable. It’s often said that any society is three square meals from anarchy.

But what’s interesting about this analysis is that Lagi and co say that high food prices don’t necessarily trigger riots themselves, they simply create the conditions in which social unrest can flourish. “These observations are consistent with a hypothesis that high global food prices are a precipitating condition for social unrest,” say Lagi and co.

In other words, high food prices lead to a kind of tipping point when almost anything can trigger a riot, like a lighted match in a dry forest.

On 13 December last year, the group wrote to the US government pointing out that global food prices were about to cross the threshold they had identified. Four days later, Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in Tunisia in protest at government policies, an event that triggered a wave of social unrest that continues to spread throughout the middle east today.

That leads to an obvious thought. If high food prices condition the world for social unrest, then reducing the prices should stabilise the planet.

But what can be done to reverse the increases. Lagi and co say that two main factors have driven the increase in the food price index. The first is traders speculating on the price of food, a problem that has been exacerbated in recent years by the deregulation of the commodities markets and the removal of trading limits for buyers and sellers.

The second is the conversion of corn into ethanol, a practice directly encouraged by subsidies.

Those are both factors that the western world and the US in particular could change.

Today, the food price index remains above the threshold but the long term trend is still below. But it is rising. Lagi and co say that if the trend continues, the index is likely to cross the threshold in August 2013.

If their model has the predictive power they suggest, when that happens, the world will become a tinderbox waiting for a match.

hmmmmmmmmm,

Well it’s here, the first day of the new school year. It’s hard to believe the boys are in 2nd and 4th grade. Today the new routine starts. Mom needs to get up at 6 and then the boys at 6:30 to adhere to the new schedule. Everyone is quite excited for this next chapter in their lives.

Yesterday the misses and I made it to the gym and then the grocery store before picking the boys up around 10:30. They went straight away to the neighbor’s house to play. We then had all 4 boys over here for a couple of hours  before Mom loaded them all up and headed off to the pool for a couple of more hours of swim time. Once home, the play continued until dinner. Finally at 6pm we coaxed both boys into their pj’s and began to get them settled down for the evening. Both boys went to sleep fairly quickly. They’re sure good boys, we’re lucky parents.

Today the U.S. Pro Cycling Challenge starts here in Colorado. Now for those of you who don’t follow pro cycling (which is probably most of you) this is a really really big deal. It’s the first time the podium winners from the Tour de France (1st, 2nd and 3rd place finishers) have ever competed together in the U.S. They say there will be over 1 million spectators here this week for the event. It’s all over the state and finishes with a race from Golden to Denver next Sunday. We’ll probably be able to walk a few blocks and see them go racing by. It’s like a little bit of Europe comes to Colorado. I’m going to make sure the boys catch some of it somewhere.

The little guy just got up after sleeping all night in his own bed. Looks like we’ve made the transition from our bed to his. Getting him his own room was a key component to making this happen. His older brother is still sleeping which is his usual routine. (he sleeps in like a teenager these days) Mom too is up and getting some coffee before making the kids lunches and a big family breakfast. We’re one of those family’s that send lunches with the boys to school. With all the over regulation in our lives, you’d think it would have filtered down to the quality of food they serve our next generation in our schools, but noooo, apparently it’s much more important to regulate other things. I guess it’s because of the lobbyists that convince (or buy off) our school boards that they need to keep buying their pre-processed foods for the kids. It’s funny because in most places, high fructose corn syrup is now outlawed but it still shows up in our kids school lunches. But wait, it gets better, how about the secret pact our government (Hillary Clinton) signed with Japan to say that their food was safe for export with no radiation so we (the people in the U.S.) would keep buying it. Now I feel for the Japanese people and their country, but most if not all of their food has been exposed to radiation. Again you have to look at news reports out of Australia as they don’t censor these things like we do. Yes it’s hard to believe here in the good old U.S.A. that our government would keep potentially harmful information from us! Even Japan came out yesterday and refused to say to their own people that their food was safe. Yet our government not wanting the economy to get any worse over here (which a worsening economy in Japan would do) refuses to tell us the truth about the levels of radiation in Japan’s exported food. Call me paranoid if you want but it’s pretty easy to figure out. Food exposed to radiation is not good for you, period. I remember the misses coming home from work one day telling me about a nanny or chef for a family who bought over $600 worth of food. She was saying the dad was some famous doctor and it took forever to shop as they would not allow her to purchase ANY produce, dairy or meat from California. When the misses pressed her as to why, she was told it was due to the high levels of radiation that came from Japan. It seems the doctor would not allow his own family to eat anything grown or raised in California. WOW. Now we find out that the ground under all those flooded collapsed reactors are really leaking even more (and still burning) since the two earthquakes over 6.5 in the last two weeks. Folks, this is going to be a problem for decades, get used to it and just pray it doesn’t happen over here. You might be asking yourself, “what does this half to do with a family makeover or me?” Well it directly affects all of our quality of life and the safety of our kids. One of our main goals is to get as healthy as we can as a family and avoiding things that are bad for you is the first step. Then we can worry about eliminating thing from our current life and diet that are bad as well.

Alright I’ll stop as no one wants to hear this bad stuff. Most people would rather not know because they think there’s nothing they can do about it. I just feel compelled to share with you all as you’re all family. How’s that for a reason! I could jump into how Obama is going to try to take as much credit as possible for Libya even though the French were the real leaders who sent cash, arms and people to help the rebels while we tried to play both sides of the fence in case he stayed in power. Just watch! Or how about how Obama hasn’t done anything about Syria which is much worse that Libya ever was, hmmm, wonder why? We’re all adults and can make up our own minds what’s most important to most politicians. In case you’re wondering, it’s GETTING RE-ELECTED!

Ok ok back to our family. We just had a big family breakfast and in the spirit of continuing our 2011 makeover, the boys now have a new routine to go along with the new school year. This year will be the first time they get an allowance. Coming with this is a whole new list of chores and responsibilities that must be completed or we deduct money from their allowance. Each boy will get $1 per day or $7 per week. In order to get this they must complete a number of chores on a daily basis. I won’t list everything but for example, every morning they must make their beds, take a shower (this is a big one!) brush their teeth (duh), eat all their breakfast, set the table (we rotate between the two boys), and clear the table. There are other chores each boy has during the week that are to be completed every few days like cleaning up dog poop and cleaning their rooms. They also now have to budget their own money. $7 is it for the week, they can spend it on whatever they want (no restrictions within reason) but when they’re out, they’re out. They also have to finish the first week before they get any money, we don’t pay up front. We’re sticking to this one and we’ll let you know how it goes. I can hear Mom and the oldest one already arguing over how his hair looks. She wants to style it with some gel and he’s saying older people don’t think that’s cool anymore! And so the battle begins. I could do an entire new blog just on school!

Ok this is running on and I don’t want to lose the few of you still reading so I’ll wrap it up for the day. Thanks for sticking with me through my musings. We hope you all have a great week and are doing well. Mom’s taking pictures today and we’ll try to get some copies and send you all some. Take care and God Bless,

It’s still hot and the forecast has us in the mid 90’s all week. The misses and I drove to Vail yesterday afternoon to go to our friends party. The journey started off slow with I-70 westbound totally shut down. It seems some truck driver drove his over sized load under an overpass and got it stuck. It took us a good 45 minutes just to get passed the gridlock. Once we hit the open road it was smooth sailing all the way to Vail. We stopped at some friends house on the way for a short visit. They have a beautiful house on the Eagle river that’s so picturesque and calming. It sure would be nice to live on a rushing stream or river. We arrived at the party about 45 minutes after it began and ran into a bunch of our friends. Jerry and Marcie, our hosts, recently bought a huge home in Boca Raton and upon hearing we might be down there later in the year, told us to make sure and let them know when we’re coming. I know he bought some huge 100 foot plus boat so when we make it down there we’ll have to go see them so the kids can get a boat ride. We left after a couple of hours and decided to drive home to Denver. The misses and I rarely get a chance to talk for any length of time without the kids, so it was great to have some time to just have uninterrupted adult talk. The 1 1/2 hour drive went so fast, we hardly noticed. We arrived home at 10:30 and decided to stay up and watch a movie. I made it through the whole thing but Mom’s going to have to watch the last 30 minutes over this morning. We finally made it to bed around 12:30 and it was eerie how quiet it was without the boys.

Speaking of the boys, they of course were at Uncle T and Aunt B’s. Before that, they spent the afternoon at their little neighbor friends playing. Their friends had been in Central America for two months and then in Kansas City for a week and finally made it home at 1:30 yesterday afternoon. I think today we’ll bbq or something as school starts tomorrow! We should see if Grandma wants to come over. The misses and the boys took the dogs up to Grandma’s earlier in the day and also went on a bike ride while I cleaned the house. It’s only been a day but I need to clean up again. I don’t know how it got so messy with no one here??? Maybe the dog had a few friends over while we were gone.

I think I’m getting arthritis is a couple of my fingers. They’re kind of painful right at the knuckle below the finger nails on 2 fingers. Must be from all the typing I do on the computer as it’s on my “typing” hand. Mom’s on the couch with me right now moving a little slower than usual due to a couple of adult beverages last night. We’re off to the gym in a few minutes to sweat it out and then we’ll go pick up the boys. It’s hard to believe it’ll be September in about 10 days, Wow.

Time to run, no politics again. In fact I think I’ll take a break and keep my opinions to myself for a bit. I’m watching the news right now and the Presidents people are blaming the Arab Spring for all our troubles, are you kidding me? Come on, I mean will this man ever take responsibility for anything? Sorry sorry, I just can’t stand it! I’d better run before I “go off” on this mess again. Let’s all just have a great day and try to do the best that we can. It’s going to be a big week so stay tuned for lots of kid news.

Take care and God Bless,

It’s about 50 degrees out at 6am this morning and some leaves have already hit the ground. I can’t wait for fall. Tonight we’re headed to the 3rd annual Jimmy Buffet party at our friends home in Lake Creek which is an exclusive suburb of Vail. They’re super nice people. Anyhow he has a home here in Colorado that’s about 20,000 square feet and is in one of the most beautiful settings you’ve ever seen. It’s always a super fun party with everyone in island garb and a band and of course great food. Uncle T and Aunt B are having the kids spend the night (thanks again) but I think we’ll just drive down late this evening. I won’t be drinking as I’m trying to get into shape for hot tub season (that means winter) and the party usually ends around 9pm. So, we should be home by 10:30 or 11. Back to the weather, it’s supposed to be in the mid 50’s up there with a chance of rain which will be really nice.

Yesterday both boys had play dates while Mom was at the hairdresser for highlights and a cut. The oldest one was gone most of the day playing put put golf and other games with his friend Max. The little guy was quite bummed so after he and I ran some errands, I picked up his friend and brought them both back to our house to play. Thankfully Mom arrived home soon and took over the duties of watching the boys. Before we knew it, it was after 4pm and we had to be at school by 5 to find out which teacher each boy will have for the upcoming year. We’re thrilled to report that both boys got the teachers they want. Of course there is a downside, in the youngest ones class, there is one kid we just don’t like who’s kind of a bully. I don’t mean physically but more mentally. He’s always telling all the kids who can play with who and that type of thing. I told the little one it’s a new year and he’s now the “coolest” one in the class and not to go along with whatever this kid says. I also gave him permission to haul off and punch the kid should he push or grab our guy at all. The kid’s just a little shit. The oldest guys class contains most of his friends so I’m sure they’ll be some “who’s playing with who” on the play ground stuff but nothing to worry about. Our guy is one of the more mature kids in the class and sometimes gets frustrated by the way some kids (the less mature ones) act but we’re trying to get him to just look above all that and study hard. At this age it’s hard for kids to understand your main job at school is to study hard but our guys will do just fine. The event finished up with free ice cream and the kids all running around with their friends. Today and tomorrow off and then a whole new routine starts.

No politics today, I’m taking a sabbatical as I just can’t stand it, whoaa, even me saying that almost had me jumping into “why I can’t stand it”. Thankfully I caught myself! I’d better start a new paragraph so I for sure won’t slip into the abyss. (I’m just dying to jump into Obama on vacation and his new amnesty plan for all the illegals) See here I go, stop it now, just stop it! (that’s me talking to myself)

Who was that guy who just wrote that paragraph above. I’d better stop kidding around so Grandma Dixie doesn’t think I’m going crazy.

Well we’ve decided we’re building some sort of cabin next Spring up in the mountains. Since my epiphany the other day that I might be getting just a tad bit older, (after getting my first senior discount), we’re all in. I refuse to end up like my dad who just wanted a nice cabin with a wrap around porch to sit on, put up his boots and read books in his later years. All he ever did was things for other people, (mostly us kids) and never had the chance to enjoy life when he got older. It’s a little bit different these days as a cabin in a rural setting is just not for relaxing these days, but also kind of a retreat or escape to a better way of life should (or when) the economy crashes. There’s an old sone that has a line that says “I’d rather be a country man than a town man, I’d rather trust a man who works with his hands”. I don;t need to go into this but you know what I mean, the people in the country or rural areas are generally not as “me me ” as those in the city. Not to be a pessimist but society as a whole is headed for a rough time before it’ll get better and it’ll be much worse in the city than the country. Plus the boys want, and should, learn how to take care of animals like horses, grow a garden, fix a pump or windmill, shoot a gun and just basically spend time in and enjoy the outdoors. The fondest memories I have as a kid are when we would go to the cabin on the lake in Wisconsin, man was that fun! I need to do this quick as I know my Mom will enjoy it too as it was originally her and my dad’s plan. It doesn’t have to (and won’t) be big, just comfortable. My Mom’s kind of a woodsy girl as it is having grown up in Wisconsin. We don’t have to worry about her. I think Aunt B is the one we need to make sure has all the comforts of home to coax her up for a visit. (just kidding, she’s a trooper too) So I think we’ll win the lottery tonight or start some kind of fund to raise the money so we can afford to build. We cashed in all the change in our “horse jar” yesterday to put it into the bank. (we’ve had a mason jar on top of the fridge where we put all our lose change to save for horses) The little guy and I cashed in $99.42 which is a pretty good start.

Speaking of the little guy, he just came down and joined me on the couch. The oldest is still sleeping as he got himself into something in the grass last night that was giving him a rash so we had to give him a dose of benadryl. I ran to the grocery store at 5:30 to get some half and half for our coffee and picked up a package of cinnamon rolls for the boys. You know the kind with the icing that take 8 to 10 minutes in the oven. Mom of course pointed out all the bad things in these but it’s not like they have them all that often.

We might try to get to the gym but want to let the oldest guy sleep as long as he wants so he’s not tired for the big night at Uncle T and Aunt B’s. It’s a nice morning being a bit cooler and should be a good day. We hope everyone is doing well and is having a great weekend. Take care and mark your calendars now for about May 2012 to come out and help build the cabin, we’ll have kind of an old fashioned barn raising.

Now that it’s in print, we have a much better chance of following through. I just need to keep thinking senior discount, senior discount. Maybe I should join AARP or buy a walker, that’ll keep me motivated!

Take care and God Bless,

That’s right, it’s over, school starts Monday and so comes the beginning of fall, leaves on the ground, the holiday season, hunting season, cold weather and football. Tonight we head over to the school for what they call the “ice cream social”. This is where the kids put all their supplies in their new classrooms and find out who their teachers are for the coming year. It then wraps up with free ice cream for each kid. We usually get in and out pretty quick. We’re sure hoping the oldest one gets his teacher of choice. As I said earlier, we think the little guy already knows who he will have.

Yesterday after some work in the morning, we called my Mom to see if she wanted to join us for lunch. We must have caught her just at the right time as she said yes! We drove out to Golden (home of Coors beer) and couldn’t find a parking spot in front of the little deli we were going to go to when Grandma suggested we all go to Table Mountain Inn. Now this is about the fanciest best place in all of Golden so we were thrilled to take her up on her invitation. My Mom and I both had enchilada’s and the boys had corn dogs and mac and cheese. It was all topped off with fried ice cream for the boys while my Mom and I split a piece of bourbon pecan pie, boy was it rich. We then drove home and decided to take a detour to drive through the old neighborhood where my Mom, Uncle T and Aunt B and I lived in her single days. The old neighborhood is still standing but a lot of the houses have been updated. I told her it was her version of “this is your life”. We then dropped her off, thanked her for buying us lunch when it was us who invited her, and headed home.

We quickly cleaned up the house a bit to prepare for Mom’s arrival from her day at work. She whipped up a quick dinner of leftovers that included some shrimp on brown rice and cantaloupe. She can do wonders with a few leftovers thankfully as you can’t let anything go to waste these days.

Being the super Mom that she is, she then loaded the boys up for a quick hour swim at the pool. I stayed home and watched the news and surfed around on the computer. Grandma Dixie called to see what we were all doing and I told her I was looking at farm land in Grand Junction to buy (actually for HER to buy) so she and Pa Don could come live in Colorado. The elevation is a lot lower there and the climate a bit better for growing things and is actually a nice community. I was of course joking but it’s fun to look, who knows, maybe one day she’ll want to get out of the cesspool called California!

Another bad day on the stock market. It seems that just like we’ve all been conditioned to bad things in our everyday lives, so has Wall Street. I don’t know if you remember or not but back in October 1989 (I think) when we had what they called Black Monday, the market dropped something like 500 or 600 points and everybody freaked out. Now it seems this happens every few days or so and we all take it in stride. I personally think that if people really knew what was going on, they’d all be pretty scared and be living their lives a little bit different. You see the World economy is like a house of cards and everyone is waiting to see which card falls first. It looks like Europe is in worse shape than us, (hard to believe) and the fall will begin over there, but like a house of cards it will all come tumbling down. We’re all too interconnected as a global economy and society that no one or nothing will be spared. I’m not sure what this will mean to you and I but it’s not going to be any better than it is now, rather quite the opposite. Hopefully it won’t be like the great depression in the late 1920’s but it very well could be. It should be noted that I’m not so concerned with all of this for the misses and I but for our kids. Imagine what life will be in 20 or 25 years! We should all be worried about the next generation, that’s what it’s all about. They don’t deserve what it looks like our generation will be leaving them. They deserve the same chance at prosperity and independence a we did. I’m not sure they way we’re going, that they’ll get that chance.

I’m headed to the gym and when I get back will ask the misses to write a few lines so we can all head into the weekend on an up note. So from me, take care and God Bless, hope you all are doing well.

Good morning. I am up and the dogs are wrestling with a new hand me down toy from Auntie B.  Tug of war is their favorite game and of course my fingers are crossed that the pups don’t knock anything over including me. The combined weight of our four legged friends is 205 pounds +….I hope neither dog lets go of the stuffed goose! They dogs are really fun to watch while they are engaged in their canine fun.

I am heading over to do the shot this morning and the I am off to Cherry Creek to have my hair done at 8:30.

The boys had a great time swimming last night and our oldest was really interested in watching one of the older boys from swim team during a diving lesson.  The older guy is on a school diving team, so he was practicing dives with flips and twists and whatever else his coach could throw at him.  After 45 minutes in the pool the youngest retired to the playground where his friends proceeded to bury him in the sand…needless to say showers with soap were mandatory when we arrived home.

Grandma Annette give me an update on Grandpa Jim.  I’ve been thinking and thinking about him and hoping all is well health wise. If he is putting together Ikea products that could be enough to raise your heart rate far beyond an acceptable level. You two should come to Colorado for a visit. We all would enjoy seeing you!!

I am off to shower and start the day. God Bless.

LF