A Year of Change

Lots going on. Jag drove to some warehouse about an hour from his place yesterday afternoon, to pick up his new bed. He said it was super heavy, but he managed to get it up the stairs into his apartment. Lori is ordering a couch and rug she found online. The apartment is pretty large and if you remember, was just remodeled and is like new. Can’t wait to see it in a week or so. Lori and I are going to stay with him to save money. We’ve started our new crash course on saving money.

I was in and out of Denver pretty fast, leaving town by 10:30am. I couldn’t believe it as when I came around the corner by Red Rocks, it started snowing! Denver was hit pretty hard. This side of the tunnel was pretty much sunny most of the day. Next week looks like it’ll be warming up into the 80’s. Any moisture now is a good thing.

Ty wants to train for an Ironman. The way he’s committed to his new lifestyle, I’m sure he’ll do it. He does need an expensive road bike and they’re like $10,000 so I don’t know how that’ll happen. It won’t be coming from mom and dad. (see the aforementioned crash course on saving money!) I told him to start a Gofund Me, ha.

Denver is so messed up these days. The evidence of this is every political tv ad by Dems are only about how bad Trump is. I guess they think this is a winning message. I see it as a sign of a politician who has zero ideas on their own and will just spend the next few years bashing Trump. Think about it, all the Dems have is “Trump bad”. I can’t think of a single idea they stand for. That’s their biggest issue. You have to separate the man from his policies. It doesn’t matter if you like Trump and the crap he says, (yea a lot of it is crude), as you need to look at all he has done and how it’ll benefit yours and America’s future. You really think we’d be better off with Kamala? Give me a break. Part of the reason we need to get out of Colorado is that it looks like our loser Senator, Michael Bennet, will be the next Governor. This guy was a school employee who was appointed by Hickenlooper and is nothing but a Dem party lap dog. He’s literally done zero to help the citizens or State of Colorado. He’ll just continue destroying this once great State. So sad.

A little cloudy up here this morning but no snow. Time to get moving. Tomorrow we’re off at 11am to Montana and back Friday afternoon. We’re going up to preview the property and make sure we like everything about it. We’ll be on the ground up there for about 25 hours, so it’ll be a quick trip.

Big hockey game tonight, go Av’s! God Bless.

Off early to drop some wine to my connection at AEG so I get tickets for Bocelli at Red Rocks in September. I have a few people that want to go so I need to take care of the guy with the tickets. I’m not sure of the date but I’ll probably be hunting.

I should be back by 2 at the latest and then need to finish up the paperwork on the land in Montana. I had it all done yesterday and then the internet went out, and of course, all my work was gone! Unbelievable. All good though. We do need to put down a bit more cash than we wanted too and thought I might need a float for a month, but I figured out a solution.

Last night we went to our neighbors son’s Eagle Scout ceremony. It was over 90 minutes long! We had no idea it would be that long. Happy to support Ethan, but it was almost comical how long it was. It was longer than any wedding we’ve ever been to.

Jag moved some stuff into his new apartment. He’s using Ava’s car which they’ve had in storage since they moved to Chicago. It had a lot of their stuff still in it waiting for the new place. Ava is still struggling with some personal issues she’s dealing with in California. We feel sorry for her and are not sure when she’s coming back, I think a couple more weeks. Guess she’s not really liking her new job either. Today Jag will order a bed and then it’ll get delivered Wednesday. He tried some out yesterday after work. Lori has a bunch of stuff being delivered from Costco too. He loves the neighborhood as it’s where they were when they moved there. It’s the nicest area in Chicago, close to downtown yet, far enough away. Great restaurants, shops, nightlife and more. We’re excited for him, finally!

Time to go, have a great day, God Bless.

Last night, after days of negotiations, we went under contract on 5 acres in Montana! It’s a great piece of property that coincidently is on the same street as Kate and Todd. I’ve known Kate for 20 years when she worked for our distributor in California back in the day. The coincidence is that I just hired her March 1st to lead our national account team! Talk about a small world. They are still in California but bought one of the 5 acre lots (there are ten total), in this area, six years ago. They’ve already built a barn and are working on building their house. She’s been helping me out with questions about the area for a couple months, but neither of us had no idea anything would come up on her street as all the lots have been sold for years. We’re super excited and couldn’t pass this up as it’s close to everything, yet away from everything. We can have cows, goats, horses, whatever we want, and even wood burning fireplaces. Those have been illegal in Commie Colorado for decades.

We should close June 19th if all goes as planned. We still need the appraisal and stuff like that, but everything looks good. It’ll be our mini farm or ranch up in beautiful, free Montana, right next to Glacier National Park and Whitefish. We’re 20 minutes to major shopping and the airport, yet off the beaten path. Flathead Lake is the largest freshwater lake in the Country and is 15 minutes away. You can literally see 25 feet down it’s so clear. Marty and Mel bought a lot last year on the lake about 40 minutes south of us and have a brand-new boat, so that’s good too. He put an Airstream on it and is planning on building too.

Here’s a quick little video from Saturday. Lori and I are flying up Thursday and back Friday, to check it out. It’s hard to see the great views with the clouds and rain. Whitefish and Kalispell are great towns and is a great area, they say the prettiest place in Montana. The airport is great with direct flights everywhere, like Denver and Chicago, and is nice and small like ours here in Eagle.

Check it out, my realtor turned his phone sideways at the end, ha.

The plan is to build next year but if we change our mind, we should make $100-$150K on the lot as it’s in one of the most desirable areas up there. We could probably sell this summer and make that much if we wanted to! We have the low down on all the neighbors from Kate, and everyone is great and most importantly, thinks like us!

I have a lot to do today. I have to wrap up the financing, have a lot of work and need to have another meeting with Paulo from Austria before he flies out tomorrow. Lori should be getting the keys for Jagger today for his new apartment. We’re flying there a week from Thursday until late Saturday night to help him get set up. It’ll be a busy two weeks.

Time to get moving. Have a great Monday.

Had some good rain last night. Should get some more today and tomorrow before it warms up. Ty went to the Rockies game with three girls, atta boy! He spent the night in Denver and will be coming home this morning. I was going to Denver tomorrow but will postpone going until Tuesday, due to 3 to 6 inches of snow at the Eisenhower Tunnel.

Jag went out with some friends last night. Good for him as he’s been studying a bunch for another SEC test. The kid is now underwriting deals which is unheard of for someone who has been there for only a few months. He’s so on top of things and amazes management every day.

Not sure what we’re doing today. I do have to meet with Davy and Paulo either today or tomorrow. The slow cooked beef ribs turned out great as always! There are a bunch leftover in the fridge and Lori will use them to make tacos for Ty for the next few days.

Lots of other stuff going on. A little work for both of us yesterday and a few fun things too. More to come next week. Happy Sunday, God Bless.

Well, Lori might have to have her tonsils taken out! This usually happens when you’re a kid, but she might need to have this done in a few weeks. Right now she has a tonsil stone which is a calcified bump on her tonsil. She’s gargling with salt water and using a water pick to try to dislodge it, but if that doesn’t work, out they’ll come! It’s a 20 minute procedure but I guess, according to our ENT doctor, the recovery is about two weeks! He told Lori, she won’t like him anymore if she has that done, ha. We should know in a week or so if she needs to go in.

Looks like some rain coming in for the next few days. This is good news. I was going to Denver Monday but might put it off until Tuesday, we’ll see. We went to Costco yesterday and today I’m slow cooking some beef ribs. They take about 8 hours but sure are good.

Ty golfed again yesterday. He’s off today. He went to the gym on the way home last night around 9pm so he wasn’t home until around 11.

Lori and I are headed out to the gym and then will be cleaning the house. That’s it for today, have a great Saturday, we’re halfway through the month! God Bless.

Nice and sunny outside. Should be a good Friday around here. Ty’s off to work and Jag’s doing well. I think he gets the keys to his apartment today. I think I mentioned a few days ago that right next door to him is a 3 Star Michelin restaurant. We looked it up and it’s like $1000 a person so we won’t be going there anytime soon. I’m not sure any meal can be worth $1000 a head. I think that’s without drinks too!

Lori has her new research project under way. I heard her on a call yesterday and the guy on the phone said she’s way ahead of all the other surgeons and hospitals in the study. It’s for some kind of new revolutionary type of artificial disc. Lori identified the project and put the entire thing together on her own. Good news is she gets all the money from it, as she did all the work and coordinated everything with the hospital and her practice. I think she gets $29k for just the start-up phase, meaning for getting site approval and putting it all together. Good for her, she’s pretty amazing at what she accomplishes. She not only figured out a way to help people through medical advancements, and increase Dr. B’s profile, but also how to get herself paid for doing it. Her whole goal was to do something extra to make more money, that would also benefit everyone and fit into her existing job. She ought to be making a million a year for all she does. This should make her a couple hundred thousand over the two-year study, which we’ll put right into savings.

Lori has a doctor appointment at 11:30 and I’m going over to Ben’s to look through a ton of old books. We had lunch with Ben and Eleni yesterday and they’re cleaning out the house as they bought a new one in Coeur D’Alene Idaho. They want us to move there bad. Ben’s a longtime friend whose dad was the Ambassador to South Africa I think under Reagan. They also have a house in Palm Desert. Ben met Eleni through us and our cigar group. His dad had three libraries in various houses all over the World so before he throws all these books away, I want to go see if there’s anything I want. He’s a super good guy and friend. His dad was also one of the founders of Vail.

7am now and it’s trash day so time to get moving. Have a great day, be well, take care and God Bless.

We have an apartment in Chicago! Thought we could move in asap, but I think it’s now June 1st. Lori is seeing what she can do about that.

Great hockey game last night. We were down 3-0 after the first period but tied it up and then won it in overtime. With this team, I thought we could come back, and we did. Fun game.

Lori works out this morning with Stacey at 7:30. I tweaked my right hand or wrist a bit lifting too heavy yesterday. I’ll live though, so no need to fret about it. I know you all are so worried!

Nice weather up here. We had a little bit more cloud cover yesterday which was nice. Maybe I’ll make a run to the dump today, we’ll see how the day goes.

Jag has his Snake Pit tickets for the Indy 500 in Indianapolis over Memorial Day weekend. Should be really fun. He has 3 or 4 friends coming in for the race.

6am now, time to go, have a nice Thursday and God Bless.

Hard workout yesterday. Apparently I have a whole bunch of muscles that need to be trained. There are so many little tweaks and moves you need to do to fire the small muscles in your body. I also hold my right shoulder higher than my left. All good stuff to learn.

Lori’s in Vail today. Looks like we’re going to Cabo around the last week of June. We were going to Hawaii for a conference on July 8th but it was going to cost over $10,000 or 753,000 miles. We would have been there for only 4 days so we decided that was too rich for us. Cabo will still be $5k but Lori’s new research partners will be there so it’s kind of a must go.

I have a couple calls with Italy today. Yesterday’s 15 minute call turned into an hour and a half. I should get paid for educating the Europeans on what the hell is going on in the World these days. They don’t listen very well. Oh well, is what it is.

Time to go, headed to the gym, GB

Warm up here. It would be nice to get a big rainstorm, without lightening.

I’m working out with Stacey at 7:30 this morning, Lori works in Vail and Ty works 10 to 2. He golfed yesterday after work and then went to the gym around 9pm on the way home. I have a call with Italy at 10am and then need to have a financial call with Seattle to go over some AR and AP. I should be done around noon.

Paulo from Austria lands at DIA today and Davy will pick him up. He’s bringing samples and brochures for the new knife sharpening company that I need to get to Toby before he hits the road next week. Another side hustle for me. Should kick off some cash to me this year if all goes as planned. Lori is working hard on her new research program which is her side hustle. We’re doing anything we can do to make some extra money over the next 18 months.

That’s about it, lots going on. Time to get moving, have a good day and God Bless.

Yesterday, after a Costco run, a trip to the gym and a walk with Lori and Ty, we went to the 4pm show of Michael, the movie about Michael Jackson. It was entertaining but if a sequel comes out, we’ll wait for video. The music was great, as it was Michael Jackson, and the story told you a lot about the turmoil of his life growing up. His nephew who played Michael, to me, came off like a cartoon character most of the time. It did give you a good look into Michael Jackson’s upbringing and his overbearing father, who was not a good guy. Reminded me a lot of my biological dad in many ways, and not in a good way. Looks like Michael Jackson and I had a lot in common. Sadly, those type of not so good parents are pretty common and many kids deal with bad crap growing up.

On a lighter note, it’s May 11th and will be in the 80’s today! Ty works and so do Lori and I. We bought Ty a new computer yesterday for his content business. To process and edit video’s, you need a fast powerful computer, so the one we bought has a terra bite of memory and is super fast. I’m sure he has it set up and was on it most of the night.

We have a flight booked to Chicago on Friday but are waiting on final confirmation of a move in date. I hope to know by 10am so if I need to change or cancel the flight, I can do it within 24 hours of booking. I did use miles and $22 so not that big a deal. We do have to fly out of Denver though meaning we’ll need to go down early that morning or the night before. We’ll stay at Jagger’s place which will save us a couple grand on a hotel. I’ll know more this morning.

6:15am now, time to go. Have a great day. Get ready for a warm week, God Bless.