It's all about Baby Samantha...or Here Today, Gone To Maui

It is another Holiday before the Holiday as the roads were barren this morning as I navigated my way to work for the first time since Christmas and our visit to Sin City. I'm hoping that John and Jennifer get moved back to California before Samantha gets old enough to ask what all the strip clubs are or why every billboard or bus has a naked butt on it. We had an absolute blast with Jennifer and John. Samantha is beautiful and Jennifer and John are excellent parents, very attentive and responsible, but they also let Samantha fuss and sleep with noise around her which will serve them well going forward. Samantha will be used to being around people and activity and not require absolute silence in order to sleep. Samantha is absolutely perfect with great coloring and wonderful features. John and Jennifer brought her out to have breakfast with us on our last day in Vegas and she did great, all bundled up and in her car seat. You can see the picture of her sleeping in her car seat, I think it is the first picture above. She slept through breakfast and was an angel. You can see the picture above of John and Jennifer outside the Black Bear Diner on Tropicana. I really like the picture of Jennifer and Samantha looking at each other. The love is certainly evident in Jennifer's eyes.

Jennifer's friend Sara came to visit during our stay and brought her daughter, Arianna, who is about seven months. It was Samantha's first play date and the pictures from her visit are above. Jennifer and John put out a play mat that they have for Samantha and the girls played. Well, Samantha laid there and Arianna played, but you get the picture. Samantha will catch up in due time. We hadn't seen Sara in months and she lives in Rocklin, the next town over from Roseville.

Jennifer had a rough delivery, but she is doing great and getting stronger every day. It was scary when she lost so much blood and fainted several times, but she got the blood transfusion and is getting rest and even Samantha is allowing her to sleep at least four hours at a time overnight. John has been great and is very helpful in changing diapers and allowing Jennifer a break when he is home. With breast feeding, there isn't much that John can do at night, but I was really proud of him as he pitched in and helped out so much with Samantha.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express on Christmas night and then moved over to the Jockey Club on Wednesday. The Jockey continues to have severe parking problems as they sold off their parking area to the Bellagio and now the owners of Bellagio, MGM, New York New York and others are in a partnership building the new casino and shopping mall that is going in next to the Jockey Club and in the spot once held by the Holiday Casino. There will be underground parking in the new venture and the Jockey will have a portion of that parking for their owners. One of the shuttle drivers told us that there is a new casino complex on the drawing boards to be started in two years called "Ice". The casino will be all futuristic with glass encased walls and neon lighting throughout and in the interior of the glass walls. The casino owners will again go in as a partnership and they are negotiating to buy all of the property from Planet Hollywood to the MGM Grand, which will include the Polo Towers. They will take down all of the existing property including the Walgreens, Smith and Wollinsky steakhouse, the Travelodge and all of the property in between. If the Jockey experience is any road map, the sale of the Polo Towers will be very difficult. The value of the building is far smaller than the total of the time share ownership and Bellagio could not agree on a price for the owners. The Polo will be even more expensive as it is a much nicer property, newer and more extensive. I'm hoping that Dad and Shirley don't end up in the same predicament with a huge construction project dwarfing the Polo. It seems like they will almost have to rebuild elsewhere in order to make the owners whole in this deal. Frankly, Darla and I enjoy the Jockey Club. With the valet parking, it is so convenient to just drop your car off and not worry about parking. The problem is that they fill up fairly quickly and we had to leave our car at Planet Hollywood twice during our stay and catch a shuttle back to the Jockey.

Darla and I are off to Maui on Thursday for a week. The blog will be delayed next week as we relax at the Hyatt in Lahaina. Silpada is paying for the trip and we are on our own for all but three meals. They have limos for the pickup and delivery at the airport, but we have rented a car for the week as we want to explore the island. This will be our first trip to Maui as a couple. I went to Maui with Dad and Mom when I was 17 and Darla has been as a young adult, but this will be our first trip together. I look forward to a week in the sun.

Well, this is short, but I have been away from work for a week, so I need to get to it. Take care and have a very safe and Happy New Year!!

Baby Samantha arrives and we head to Vegas

Funny, but Darla and I thought we'd wait until mid January and our trip to Hawaii was complete before coming to Vegas to see Samantha. Well, the tug of a new granddaughter was far too strong and with the help of Dad and Shirley, here we are in Las Vegas. The trip on Christmas day was as easy as the return on Thanksgiving was difficult and even after an hour stop for lunch in Barstow at the only open sit down restaurant open in town (IHOP), we still arrived at the hotel by 3 PM after leaving Roseville at 6 AM. We actually made the trip in about eight hours of windshield time, which is pretty darn fast. The traffic was moving at about 80 MPH the bulk of the trip. I drove from Roseville to Barstow with one stop for gas and for a potty break for Darla outside Fresno.

We saw Samantha last night and only stayed for about three hours as Jen and John had company all day with John's Dad and Step-Mom over for a Christmas visit. They left shortly after we arrived at 4 PM and we had a great visit. The boys bought Darla a new digital photo machine for Christmas that is portable and makes 4x6 prints of pictures from the digital camera. We left the machine with Jennifer and John so they could print some pictures and when I talked to Jennifer today, she was copying some pictures. Samantha is, by the way, adorable. She is so small, but has long fingers and toes. She was born last Friday at about 11:30 AM and was 7 pounds even and 19 1/2 inches long. Thin and tall. She sleeps alot and is hungry quite often. Jennifer and John are doing great with her, feeding and bathing and changing diapers. They are a little frustrated with not being able to comfort her when she gets cranky, but they will learn what she needs, whether it is food, or burping or being rocked. She was fussy when they changed her last night, but she calmed right down when Jennifer fed her. They are very good parents, attentive and protective and Darla and I just don't want to be in the way while we are here. We've said that we will be available to help Jennifer during the day as John is back to work, but will leave by 7 PM each night to give them some "family time" together. We will leave for home mid afternoon on Saturday and drive straight back. That will give us Sunday to relax at home.

Jennifer and John said that they plan to take Samantha on her first outing on Saturday and we will buy them lunch at The Black Bear Diner on Tropicana. Darla and I had dinner there last night after we left. Jennifer and John bought me a little desk set with a pen and pencil and a letter opener. All of the items fit in a small golf bag that holds the pens, etc. The whole thing is about five inches tall and two and a half inches wide and has pockets and a carry strap just like a golf bag. Jennifer had engraved on it "To Dad, my Hero. Love , Jennifer" Very Nice. Darla got a bath set in a small crystal tub with legs. We bought the kids gift certificates. Jen got a Visa card and John got Home Depot. He already bought a palm sander and wants to get a Shop Vac as well.

Darla is upstairs in the Holiday Inn telecommuting and I am down in the business center updating the blog. I have a large account that closes on Friday and I've left Gail and Dinda in charge of getting it done and closing the deal. Hopefully, they can get it done. I was planning to be in the office this week, but Samantha came calling.

Diane, Jennifer's Mom, was here for the birth, barely making it in on Friday before Samantha arrived. In fact, she left her bags at the carousel in Vegas and grabbed a cab to the hospital. She arrived about a half hour before Samantha. Jennifer had such a great and uneventful pregnancy, so naturally the birth was difficult. Labor was long and painful (about eleven hours) and she didn't get an epidural until about eight hours into the labor. When they finally gave her the shot and numbed her from the waist down she was fine. The second problem was the delivery, where Samantha ended up breached and they had to do a double apiesiotomy (sp?) and her shoulder still got caught in the birth canal and ripped Jennifer on delivery. ( I never thought I'd need a medical dictionary to do the blog!)

All of the pain and tearing didn't deter Samantha and she came into the world perfect. Jennifer, however, lost a lot of blood and passed out three or four times. They finally had to do a blood transfusion before sending her home on Saturday. The doctor wanted Jennifer's body to heal itself, but Jennifer wanted to get home and asked for the transfusion. She is sore, but is thrilled to be home with her new addition. I will add pictures next week.

We enjoyed Christmas with the boys back home on Monday before leaving for Vegas. Darla's folks came over and Alica and her boyfriend, Don. Darla fixed a big Prime Rib, and I mean big: it was 14.5 pounds. We brought the leftovers with us and Darla will fix prime rib for the gang at Jennifer's tonight. We bought the boys a Wii Nintendo, which is an interactive video game where you use a controller and bowl or golf, fish, tennis, box, baseball, etc. We had a blast playing it on Christmas Eve and even had Earl and Francis up bowling. Darla and I won the team bowling with a combined 167. We also went to Christmas Eve service after dinner and enjoyed the Christmas music and the message from pastor Rick. He even came over and met the family, which is nice in a building that seats 3000.

We will check int the Jockey Club tonight and Thank You Dad and Shirley for making this trip possible. Samantha is a JOY.

Well, I will add more to this next week. I hope all are well, had a great Christmas and plan to celebrate the New Year next Monday and Tuesday. Ciao.

Last Christmas Party of the Season

It's been fun, but I can't say I'm shedding any tears over the fact that it is done. I had to host two of the parties and it is a little distracting and certainly time consuming making sure that all of the tees are crossed and i's dotted. Both parties went off with nary a hitch and we truly enjoyed using Dinda and JP's home this year. As you can see from the pictures, they have a home that accommodates a large party very well. I called JP and Dinda up at one point and we presented them with a $100 gift certificate to Scott's Seafood restaurant and Dinda quickly blurted out, "We'll do it again next year". I also gave her a $50 Starbucks card for being such great sports and allowing all of us to trample through their beautiful home every year. She took a sabbatical a few years ago and the party was at our house. Although it was still fun, our home can't quite as comfortably accommodate 35 people. It was a little tight. We did two twelve pound turkeys and a ham from Honey Baked Hams this year and although it was a little more expensive, the food was certainly better. We also went through eleven bottles of wine (including five 750 ML bottles), two and a half cases of beer, a 12 pack of Mike's Hard Liquor variety pack, two bottles of Martinelli's cider, two bottles of champagne, two cases of soda and 48 bottles of water. Gail brought hors de oeuvres, Darla fixed mashed potatoes and stuffing and a green bean casserole, Cora brought garlic bread, Steve brought some M&Ms and Pete brought the carving knife and cut the turkey this year.

We did the gift exchange again and everyone enjoyed the experience. Darla and I ended up with an Almond Rocha gift pack and two tickets to the 49ers-Bengals game on Saturday. We checked with the boys to see if they wanted to go to the game. David couldn't make it, but Daniel and his Dad went to the game and actually saw the 49ers 4th win of the season as they beat the Bengals. Darla and I brought a dinner gift certificate and a collector copy of the Bourne Ultimatum DVD. Darla took pictures of each couple as they left and I've posted those on the office G Drive so everyone can view the pictures. It was a lot of fun, but I'm glad it's over.

I had a golf club board meeting on Saturday morning and the gavel was turned over to me. I will sit on my first board meeting as President in January and then host the first Open Meeting of 2008 on January 17th. We all met for breakfast and the board presented Neil (the outgoing President) with a $150 gift certificate in the pro shop. I will lean heavily on Neil's guidance in 2008 as I navigate the club throughout the year. I will likely be the most popular and the most reviled President as I plan to begin penalizing players for slow play. Our rule is that you have to finish within 4 hours and 40 minutes or within fifteen minutes of the foursome in front of you. If you miss both of these guidelines everyone in the foursome will receive a 2 stroke penalty. It is the number one issue in the club and the rule has been on the books for a full year, but has not been imposed as yet. I will have a representative on the first hole to note the starting time and on the 18th hole to monitor the groups.

We played golf after breakfast and I managed an uninspired 40+44=84. I basically fell asleep on the back side and messed up a good round of golf. The final eclectic scores and payouts came out last week and I went back over the year to see how much I had won. I finished in the money in 13 tournaments and won a total of $579.50 in the club this year. Not too shabby. My handicap varied from 9.0 to 11.9 this year and I finished the year at 9.3. I didn't win the club championship in my flight nor did I get a spot on the Rose Cup team, two of my goals, but it was otherwise a very good year. I was runner-up in the Club Championship and got in a playoff for the final Rose Cup spot.

I played in a Texas Hold'em tournament Saturday night at a friends house. He had 21 players and I was the 8th player out of the tournament. I just couldn't get any cards. The winner won $500 and he paid 5 spots. I did knock the host out on an All In when I pulled a straight on the river. I've played in two of the Texas Hold'em tournaments and I have to say I'm not a huge fan of the game simply because there is little skill employed in the game. It is all luck and bluffing. I prefer five card draw.

Sunday, Darla and I did little more than lay in front of the fire and relax. We got up for church and I was hard pressed to stay awake during the sermon. I think the weekend's activities finally caught up with me. We both slept for about two hours on the couch with a nice roaring fire in the fireplace. We awoke to a smoldering fire and I had to rebuild it from scratch. We had the fire going from ten AM until we went to bed last night. I watched Dallas lose and go from the second best record in the NFL to the second best record in the NFL. They have to win their last two games to assure home field advantage in the playoffs and hopefully they learned that they can't just wait until the end of the game to put a team away.

We talked to Jennifer last night and she is beginning to dilate and has about a week to ten days until the baby comes (supposedly). Samantha may make her appearance this week or wait until after Christmas. Hard to say. We meant to give Dad and Shirley a call, but it got too late last night and we will try to call them tonight.

Well, it is payroll today and I have to approve everyone's hours, so off I go. Have a great week leading up to the celebration of the birth of our Saviour. By the way, the announcement of my promotion was in the Business Journal last week. Here is the link to the article:

http://sacramento.bizjournals.com/sacramento/potm/2007-12-10/

Busy Sports Weekend

This was a weekend filled with sporting events. Darla and I hosted our friends, Dave and Missy, at the Sacramento Kings vs. Los Angeles Clippers game at Arco Arena on Friday night. We went to dinner beforehand and had a good time in spite of the abhorrent play of Sacramento's NBA entry.

Saturday I played golf in the Eclectic Final. This is the last golf tournament of the year and the final tournament that is eligible for the year long contest for best score on every hole. We track each player's best score on every hole and use that final scorecard as a final tournament. So, in essence, it is two golf tournaments in one. I was able to improve my personal best 65 to 63 with birdies on two of the par threes. Unfortunately, I also missed a five foot putt for birdie on the only par five that I hadn't birdied during the year. My best ended up 30+33=63 for a net 53. I took first low net in my flight on the overall and with a 42+38=80 in that day's tournament, I took third low net for the day. I was frustrated with my 42 on the front because I thought I was striking the ball really well and I was able to go birdie, par, birdie on the start of the back nine. In fact I was two under on the back with four holes to play and finished bogey-bogey-bogey-bogey for the 38. it could have been better, but I was pleased. I will finish the year at a 9.3 index and plan to stay single digits for the next twenty years or so.

Saturday night we were invited to my assistant's house for her mother's 80th birthday celebration. Dinda lives in a 7000 sq foot mansion on Fair Oaks Boulevard in Carmichael and I hadn't seen it yet. It is a larger version of her 3500 sq ft house in Carmichael that her daughter and son-in-law bought from her. It is really the same floor plan with two extra bedrooms and larger everything. The one main difference is a second smaller kitchen upstairs. Dinda is Filipino and has a huge extended family. There were probably 100 people at the party and about 75% were family. They did karaoke with the sons and daughters singing Paul Anka's hit "Diana" to their Mom, but changing the words to "Our Mother". I don't know that they really thought it out particularly deeply as there is a stanza that goes "We're so young and you're so old.." Darla and I laughed when they sang that. They also had a ballroom dance instructor who danced with her Mother as ballroom dancing is one of their loves. Then each of the boys and each of the daughter's husbands cut in and danced with her as well. It was well done. The grand kids all sang "We are the world" to her and one granddaughter did a hula dance and another played guitar. One son and daughter-in-law sang a Fillipino love song to her. I think it was "Sapagkat Ikaw ay Akim", but it might have been "Sapagkat Kami ay Tao Lamang", the two are very similar (that is sarcasm for anyone who doesn't know me). We will all gather on Friday night at Dinda's house for our Staff Christmas party.

Sunday, I met up with Pete from my office and six other guys for a limousine ride into San Francisco for the 49er-Viking NFL game. The 49ers are so bad, they are virtually unwatchable. It was 27-0 at the half and 27-7 by the end of the third quarter. We had great seats with Dan and I sitting in a lower box five rows from the field on the 30 yard line. After the third quarter we decided to head back to the limo where it was warm and we had food and drink, so four of us headed back and caught up with the limo driver. The other four were in two different sections of the stadium and they stayed until the end of the game. Two of the four got lost and we didn't end up leaving the stadium until almost six o'clock. The two that got lost actually got separated from each other as well and only one had a cell phone. We sat in the car and played phone tag with these inebriates and finally got everyone in the car. It took us three hours to travel the 100 miles home because of two accidents on the freeway. At one point, one of the drunk guys jumped out of the limo and ran into a Shell station to get some chewing tobacco and we were about three blocks away by the time he caught back up with us. The problem is he didn't tell anyone he was going, he suddenly jumped out of the limo and was gone! On top of that, he had taken his shoes off and was in stocking feet in downtown SF. What a boob. This is the same guy that wore a Vikings sweatshirt to Candlestick Park (Monster Park for the ad age) and was surprised that he got punched in the head by an angry Niner fan. When he told me the story, I was just surprised that their was a Niner fan who still gives a damn. That is one pathetic football team. So that was my weekend of sports and fun.

Last week, I hosted two of our Vice-Presidents from home office in for an audit of our USF files (USF is the Kaufman owned Insurance company that we place business with). Ken and Ken both visited our San Francisco branch Monday and Tuesday and then drove up to Sacramento for Wednesday-Friday. They arrived about 11:30 on Wednesday morning and I could tell that our Underwriting VP, Ken, wasn't feeling too well. He was carrying a large white cotton towel and was spitting into it every few minutes. I asked him what was wrong and he said that he had a piece of meat lodged in his throat from dinner the night before. I told him to go to the doctor and we called an Urgent Care facility. They directed him to the Emergency room of the hospital and he drove himself over. They finally got him into a procedure at 5:30, where they numbed his throat with a spray, gave him a general anesthesia and used a tube to push the meat down into his stomach. Well, lo and behold, they managed to rupture his esophagus in the procedure and Ken was stuck in the hospital from Wednesday until this morning when they finally released him. The tear is beginning to heal itself and he has to stay on soft foods for the next ten days and then have a specialist look at him again and do a barium test to make sure there is no more leakage. Unbelievable. His wife in Detroit was frantic and called me to see if I could sit with him Thursday and Friday. Apparently, this is the second time this has happened to him (cut your food into bite sized pieces and then chew 32 times before swallowing!). I told her that I had a branch to run, but that I would get over there both days at lunchtime. I talked to his doctor and he said that this is very common, especially with men between the ages of 35-55. There are men found dead in restaurant restrooms every day because they are too proud to admit that they are choking and pass out in the bathroom and die of asphyxiation. Gail, my underwriter who lives near the hospital, is driving him to the airport as I write this. Our audit went well and we now write over $3,000,000 with USF which puts us at number three in terms of volume with USF.

Well, that is it. I told Jennifer I'd have pictures of Darla and I learning to ballroom dance, but they decided not to do the dance lessons and just opened it up to dancing. You don't want to see a picture of me dancing. It is Elaine Benes all over again. Ciao.

The Christmas Season has begun

The holiday season kicked off for us Saturday night with the Roseville Golf Club Christmas Party. We again held the proceeedings at the Sunrise Golf Club and Denise and her staff proceeded over a great dinner of Prime Rib, chicken and all of the side dishes. I was installed as the new President of RGC and was happy to pass on the duties as VP to Rick, my new Vice President. I was in charge of the Christmas party and all of the gifts and making sure that everyone had a good time. Darla and I bought roses for each of the wives and had at least one present for each member of the club. We had rounds of golf, car washes, dinner certificates, pottery Barn gift certificates, Home Depot certificates, several golf clubs and bags, several golf lessons, several gift baskets and about seven gift packages of booze (Crown Royal, Cutty Sark, 1800 tequila, Cabo Wabo Tequila, Michael Collins Irish Whiskey, E&J Brandy and Bailey's Irish Cream). We also had several hats and shirts from different courses in Hawaii, San Diego, pebble Beach and Carmel that one of the members rounded up during the year. I won a Torrey Pines hat and shirt, which luckily are different from the hat and shirt that I bought while I was there. It was a good time and the mantle has been passed. We have a meeting in two weeks where we will have both the outgoing and incoming board present for a celebration of another good year of golf for the club. There are about two dozen people who routinely help run the club and there will only be three new members on the 12 person board, with a new webmaster and two new board members, including my friend, Bob, who is taking over Rick's unexpired term as a member-at-large as Rick steps up to the Vice President duty.

I did play golf on both Tuesday of last week at Auburn Country Club and again on Saturday in the final Diamond Tournament of the year. I didn't play inspired golf either day and managed an 84 at both courses. I actually played well on the front side at Diamond with a 40, but had both a double bogey and a quadruple bogey on the back for a 44. The quad was a seven on a par three as I hooked my drive out of bounds left and then hit my third shot (second drive) dead right into a tree. It was frustrating, but I've played really well lately and was due for a couple of rounds that brought me back to earth. The round at Auburn CC was fun, but the ground up there is so hard and frozen that it is hard to keep the ball on the green if you hit right into it.

Darla is doing really well with her jewelry business and now has a team of 17 representatives that are out selling sterling silver jewelry. We will be in the air to Hawaii in January courtesy of her business and spend 5 days in Maui soaking up the sun. She has been very busy the last month and is just starting to slow down. I think she has about four more parties in December and then will slow down into January.

Work continues to go well and we were up about 12% in November and hope to finish the year strong. The staff is doing well and we all dressed up in Christmas colors last week and Darla came in to take pictures for our staff Holiday card. This is the second year that we took a picture and had a holiday card made up. In the past, we had the stiff corporate card, but decided to personalize it last year as so many of our agents know the underwriters personally but have never seen the rest of the staff. Darla took the regular staged picture of us all standing and smiling, but then asked us to throw our hands in the air and look like we were having a good time. That is the picture that we used as shown below:

We have done very well this year, but we are poised for a breakout year in 2008 with Steve taking over a new territory and the rest of the underwriters focusing on our top twenty five agents to give even better service and grow our books even larger and more profitably. I am focused on trying to add another underwriter in 2008 with a book of business that can come in and help us to grow our premium book even larger. Now that I am the Branch manager, I'm focused even more on the bottom line and my focus is growing the book and reducing expenses. We will go paperless in 2008 and every piece of paper that comes into our office will be scanned and then shredded. We will go live on Cinco De Mayo and with what I have heard from other managers who have made the switch, I will likely be drinking that day.

I didn't get a chance to talk to Dad or Jennifer over the weekend, but they were supposed to get together for dinner on Friday night and Dad and Shirley flew home on Saturday. The weather remained seasonal for them in Vegas as the temperatures were in the 50's and 60's with cold overnight temps. Shirley was hoping to get in some pool time, but it was just too cold.

We will have the staff Christmas party a week from Friday at my assistant's new 6000 square foot home in Fair Oaks. We will have both a turkey and a ham and will do our annual gift exchange where we draw numbers, open a gift and then the next person can either open another gift or "steal" the one from the first person. A gift can be stolen three times, so it is usually good to get a number around 16-20 as you get a good look at the booty and can sometimes make the final steal on that bottle of Patrone or the nice throw blanket. it is a lot of fun and a chance for everyone to let their hair down and have fun. I will be buying the booze and food and also buying dinner certificates for each of the staff as a present from me.

Well, work awaits, so I am off to the salt mines. Be good to each other. Ciao.

Vegas Thanksgiving.

Well, it was a high time in the desert. Jennifer and John were excellent hosts for Thanksgiving 2007 and we had a blast. Jennifer surprised us with a trip to Baby's First Image and a chance to see my granddaughter live for the first time. The image is done with a sound wave that captures the image of Samantha in 3D. It was a great deal of fun and she had her eyes open and was sticking her tongue out at David and Daniel and I think she even flipped off David at one point. She is a feisty little girl. Jennifer found out that Samantha is already 6 pounds, 5 ounces and still has another three or four weeks to grow. I think that got Jennifer's attention a little bit.

The turkey was great and the leftovers as great as we ate turkey sandwiches and leftover pie and dressing for two days. Darla and Jennifer made Nanaimo bars for Dad and Shirley's arrival on Saturday and we enjoyed those with pizza and games on Saturday night. I'm glad that Dad and Shirley were able to join us and see Jennifer's apartment. John and Jennifer have made a nice home in Vegas and have a good life. Jennifer, I think, is still a little homesick as she has only a few friends in the area and when John is gone traveling, she is a bit lonely. She has her cats and snake to keep her company and soon Samantha will grace their lives and then the fun will really begin. John and Jennifer have the nursery all set and decorated to the nines in anticipation of little Sam's arrival. The thought is that Sam may come sooner than later as she is getting bigger and pretty active. I think Jennifer is ready to give birth and is really looking forward to being a Mom. John is equally excited and prepared to be a good father. It is heartwarming to see them so committed and focused on being good parents.

We had a good time playing games at John and Jennifer's. We played "Catchphrase", which is an electronic game like "password" played in teams and is exciting and fun. Shirley kept looking at her word and patting her head and saying "Ohmigosh!" before giving her clues. Jennifer was more demonstrative. She would start to give a clue, then look up and say, "nope" and change to another word. We had a lot of laughs. Jennifer bought a game called "Are you smarter than a fifth grader?" and we all proved not to be. The signature question was "What is the product of a horse and a zebra?" a. donkey, b. zorse, c. zebra, d. horse, e. mule. The answer is zorse. Now, how would a fifth grader know that? A zorse? We also played dominoes and the boys, John and Jennifer played a Playstation game of Grand Prix motorcycles. We watched a video, went to bowling alley and didn't bowl (the wait was too long), went to a car show at the Vegas convention center, had lunch at Pei Wei in Vegas, went to breakfast at Aces, a 24 hour bar right outside of Jen and John's apartment complex, and met the gang for breakfast at Bill's Gambling Hall on the strip Sunday morning before we left town.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express near Jennifer's apartment and it proved to be a nice home away from home. We got rates of $103 for the first two nights and $113 for Friday and Saturday. That was for two queen beds and a nice breakfast buffet each morning. The Inn is brand new and very nice, but one of the elevators smells like an animal died in it. i blamed the boys for the smell when we got there Wednesday night, but it was there every time we got in the elevator.

The drive home yesterday was nothing short of brutal as we hit traffic about a half hour out of Vegas in Jean and was in stop and go traffic until we finally got thru the stop light intersection on Highway 58 in the Mojave desert. It took us 8 hours to get from Vegas to Bakersfield, a trip of about 290 miles. It is close to the halfway point from Vegas to Roseville so we were concerned. The trip is about 9.5 hours generally, but the traffic thinned and after dropping Daniel back at his buddy's in Lemoore, we were home by 9:45 PM. Still a twelve hour marathon and if I were to do the trip again, I would stay over Sunday and drive back Monday or Tuesday. Cars were a t a dead stop in the desert in the Mojave and people were going off road in the desert to get around the backup. We saw more cars in Mojave and Tehachapi that were white from the sand of the desert. we could always tell the offroaders. We just hung in there and waited it out. We did drive from 9:30 until almost 5:00 PM before stopping for dinner. We were going to stop sooner, but had the 49er game on radio which went into overtime and the boys wanted to listen to the game rather than eat. We finally stopped in Tulare at Sonic and had dinner.

We were able to meet John's dad and step-mom and his 4 year-old sister, Olivia. Olivia is a precocious little girl and she is very enamored of her older brother. We had a nice visit on Thanksgiving and it was nice to meet John, Sr. My only comment on marriage was when John, Sr and his family left on Thursday night and I told him we'd see him at the wedding next year.

Well, work awaits. I've greeted the gang as they have all wandered in as I was writing this. I have a visit from the Underwriting Manager of our Los Angeles office today, who was in town for the holiday and wanted to come in and see my office. Tomorrow I will take the day out of the office. I have several things to get done for the RGC Christmas party and will then meet Neil, Boyd and Robert for a golf outing at the Auburn Country Club. I have to get my golf fix. It's been ten days. I hope all are well. Be good and keep walking in the shadow of the LORD. Ciao.

Thanksgiving Week and we are Vegas bound

We will be in the car for ten hours on Wednesday driving to Vegas and my first Thanksgiving with my new granddaughter. Well, sort of, she is still a bun in the oven, but she is real. Samantha Paige is on her way. Daniel will join us about mid-trip as he will get a ride to Kettleman City and we will pick him up and drive on to Vegas.

Darla got concerned that the whole Thanksgiving dinner was causing Jennifer too much stress so we decided to order the dinner from a local grocery chain and Vons will prepare the meal now. Jennifer's apartment is just too small for a major dinner production and Jennifer was worrying about it all a little too much. Now we will simply reheat the turkey and perhaps make some fresh stuffing (as Von's has cornbread stuffing) and we will be in. Jennifer is making some sort of yam pudding or something with pecans and such. I'm not a big yam guy, but I'll give it a try. Darla is bringing some pumpkin pie and we will be in hog heaven come Thursday. As long as Jennifer and John have a working television, I'll be set. I look forward to the visit and to Dad and Shirley's arrival on Saturday. I'll give you a call tomorrow night, Dad, to confirm your flight times and will be there to pick you up at the airport. Saturday night will be game night at Jennifer's house with pizza and soda on tap. We will join Dad and Shirley for Sunday brunch at one of the casinos Sunday and will be on the road home after that.

The pictures above are cell phone camera quality as I forgot my digital camera at home and wanted to record our trip to Santa Cruz and the fantastic Pasatiempo golf course. Pasatiempo was built in 1929 by Alister Mackenzie, one of the truly great golf course architects of the twentieth century. His other courses include Cypress Point in Pebble Beach and Augusta National in Augusta, Georgia (site of the Masters). Interestingly, Pasatiempo was Alister's favorite course and he lived in a home off the sixth fairway for the rest of his life after the course was finished. Our day at Pasatiempo was perfect with a temperature of 70 degrees, no wind and perfect conditions on the course. We could see the ocean off the first tee and there was some fog over parts of the ocean, but it never pushed inland. I played great on Thursday and shot 39+41=80 on a very difficult course. Bob shot 83 and Boyd had a fantastic day with a 33+39=72 and his round included a hole-in-one on the 195 yard fifth hole. Coincidentally, it was the hole where we chose to take pictures of the group, so where I am pictured with Boyd he actually had a hole in one moments after the picture was taken. Both Bob and I saw the ball bounce and disappear into the hole. It was Boyd's sixth hole in one and his second this year. I had to harass him as I was the first to the green and looked in the hole and said, "Nope, it's empty, you must have gone over the green." Boyd didn't fall for it and we celebrated with drinks on the course when the cart girl made it around to us. It indeed has been a magical year of golf at some world class venues and I hope to continue the trips next year. I'm looking at Bandon, Oregon for our next trip and would also like to get out to Myrtle Beach, SC for a trip in the near future.

I played in the Turkey shoot on Saturday and shot 42+42=84 for a "could have been better" round of golf. I was five over par after 12 holes after birdieing 10, but fell apart and shot seven over in the last six holes. I've played a lot of golf recently and will take about ten days off now before playing again.

The Roseville Golf Club Christmas party is a week from Saturday and I'm in charge of the festivities this year. I'm gathering prizes and setting up the music and meals. I've also ordered some trophies and a few gifts for the outgoing President. I have yet to buy a new blazer which will need to have the club crest sewn on the front. All of the former presidents have the blazers and the only time they are worn is at the Christmas party.

Darla repainted the kitchen and breakfast nook on Saturday as I was golfing. She changed the color from blue to a lighter shade of the chocolate brown that is in the family room. For some reason she is on a painting kick and said that she couldn't find any fabric that would complement the brown and blue for the window coverings, so repainted the kitchen. Go figure.

I talked to Randy and Christopher yesterday. Chris' football team lost on Thursday night at Texas Stadium 24-21 and is out of the Texas High School playoffs. Their strength this year was defense and ultimately, the offense couldn't score enough to keep them alive to move on. Chris is ready to now explore his options in college ball and will put his energy into visiting teams and deciding where to spend the next five years of his football life. Good luck, Chris.

Well, work awaits on a short week so I better get to it. Have a blessed Thanksgiving and surround yourself with family. That's my plan. Ciao.

Torrey Pines, San Diego and Continuing to Live the Dream

Wow. Another great trip is in the books and I REALLY enjoyed Torrey Pines. The weather was partly cloudy and temperatures in the mid sixties. The course is absolutely beautiful and the venue is breathtaking. We flew out at 7:30 AM on Friday and arrived at 9 AM in San Diego. By the time we got our rental car (a Chrysler 300 instead of a Chrysler Pacifica SUV by the way. Now, why do we make reservations again? Perhaps only the car companies' know.) and over to the course it was about 10:30. Our tee time of 12:40 was too late to get in 18 holes and I'd tried to call and move us up, but to no avail. The guy on the line said, "Just get here early and let the starter know you'd like to get out ASAP. You'll have no problem as we've had so many cancellations because of the fires." Sure and pigs fly. We finally teed off at 12:30 after enjoying a nice breakfast in the Grille room and hitting balls at the practice range and putting. While I was on the putting green, a Japanese gentleman approached me nodding and bowing. I couldn't quite make out what he wanted and finally he pointed at my rear end and I had the paper safety seat from the rest room tucked into my pants and trailing behind me. I wasn't sure what the weather would be when I left home and had worn shorts covered by Reebok work out pants. Apparently, when I'd visited the men's room after a hearty breakfast, I'd brought the paper toilet seat cover with me and couldn't feel it as it was between my shorts and the exercise pants. Classy dude, eh?

The courses we played over the two days were tough, championship style courses and it makes me realize that my handicap is artificially low because of the level of courses that I regularly play and how well I know those courses. I shot 45+42=87 on Friday at Torrey Pines and finally figured out the speed of the greens on the back nine. I managed a birdie 3 on number ten and will watch the pros at the US Open to see how many can't match my score on that hole. The glider port off hole number three is interesting and you can see a picture of one of the human kites flying by on the tee at number 4. At one point there were about eight kites in the sky at one time flying by the beach off the cliffs next to that hole. How they keep from whacking into each other as they twist and turn in the air current is beyond me.

In the pictures above, the first picture is Mel and I. Mel is the husband of my personal lines renewal underwriter, Cora, and we have played golf together for 4 years. The second picture is of me and Boyd. Boyd is a 4 handicap and a regular in my golf group on weekends and in tournaments. Boyd is 67 years old and shot his age in a round this past May. Boyd also joined me at Pebble Beach in April. The third picture is of the course at Barona Creek in Lakeside. Barona Creek is at an Indian Casino outside San Diego and was the home to the Nike Tour Championship event in October. The course is beautiful.

We were supposed to have a foursome for the weekend, but one of Boyd's friends has a father who was just put into hospice and he had to bow out of the trip. He is a member at Barona Creek and set up the golf for us there. Unbeknownst to us, he had comped the $160 per round golf for us on Saturday, so that was a nice surprise as we arrived and were treated royally by the course. We had a 10:40 tee time and as our names were called and we were receiving instructions from the starter, one of the golf club managers approached the starter and drew him aside. I happened to overhear their conversation and the club manager told the starter that they had a VIP that wanted to get out earlier than his 11:50 tee time and to fit him in. It turns out that the "VIP" was the best friend of Oprah Winfrey's boyfriend. Hopefully, I am never that desperate that I have to use my status as the best friend of some nobody to get on a golf course.

Barona was in even better shape than Torrey, but it is located in a valley surrounded by rocky hills and is definitely second rate to the Torrey Pines venue. Again, i struggled early with a 45 on the front side, but pulled it together and had back-to-back birdies on the backside and shot 40 for an 85. Boyd, who shot 85 at Torrey, struggled to a 42 on the front, but played lights out on the back with a one under 35 for a 77. Mel shot 96 at Torrey and 91 at Barona.

I traveled with a 55 year old and a 67 year old and when I suggested that we go out to dinner in La Jolla on Friday night was shut down. Boyd didn't want to have to get back in the car and instead we opted to eat at the Sheraton. It turned out o be a good choice as we had their Prime Rib and scallops, a glass of wine, the Cajun corn chowder and a salad and paid $30 each. The hotel gave us a voucher for 50% off our dinner tab. We finished dinner at 9 PM and headed back to our rooms. Mel roomed with me and we watched the Kings-Cavaliers game on ESPN. I had to give up my tickets to the game to go to San Diego and wanted to enjoy the game. I was hooting and hollering and finally Mel rolled over and said, "Ken. I'm tired. Aren't you tired?" I was out with the party animals this weekend. I quietly watched the rest of the game and went to bed at 10:30. Wild times in San Diego.

I came home to rain and overflowing gutters. The rain was over by yesterday and I spent part of the day raking leaves and the other clearing the gutters. I have gutter guards over the entire length of my rain gutters, but small leaves and dirt still get into the gutters and mulch up and finally clog the downspouts. I hosed out the entire length of gutters and refitted the gutter guards and hopefully will be good for the rest of the rainy season. This last storm knocked down a lot of the leaves and it will take a final cold snap to knock out the remaining leaves. The city is good at collecting the leaves when I rake them and leave them in piles in the street.

Daniel was home this weekend and Darla's brother, Steve, was here from Hawaii, so the Westra clan had a Thanksgiving celebration on Saturday. I had to miss it because I was in San Diego, but the group had a great time. It was quite a storm on Saturday night and Darla and the boys had to traverse the route home from Paradise in a downpour. There was ground fog in Paradise and it was slow going coming home. They got home about 12:30 AM and I was fast asleep.

Darla has ordered a new laptop. She got in trouble at work for using her company laptop to conduct Silpada business. The lady in HR that handled the meeting is one of Darla's Silpada customer's, strangely enough. She has ordered a new HP laptop and is getting an employee discount through her friend, Missy, who works for HP.

Work awaits. it is Veteran's Day and the city of Sacramento is in Holiday mode as this is a government town and most of the population is off on a holiday. It took me about 25 minutes to drive the 18 miles to work today and the on ramps didn't even have the carpool lanes in operation today as the traffic was so light. I will close the office early today and send everyone home to their families mid afternoon. I hope you all are well. I'm off to Santa Cruz and Pasatiempo on Thursday for golf with one of my agents. My assistant, Dinda, had a premature granddaughter born on Friday with induced labor. Camille Elyse is only 2 lbs, 10 oz and has a rare vascular malformation. She is only given a 2% chance to live, so please pray for Dinda, her daughter Gina and little Camille. Ciao.

Indian Summer

It is a staple of Autumn in Sacramento and we love it. Indian Summer is back and the weather the last two days (where I spent part of both days coincidentally on the golf course) have reached the mid-eighties. The temperatures for the rest of this week will be in the mid seventies and I leave Friday morning for San Diego/La Jolla and the majesty of the Torrey Pines South golf course. It has been a tour of outstanding golf venues here in my 50th year of life and I'm not ready for it to end. I also have a tee time at Pasatiempo Golf Course in Santa Cruz next Thursday courtesy of Charles Schwab. Pasatiempo is a Class A golf course and their midweek rounds cost $200 with cart. I'm taking one of my agents and making it a marketing outing. Nice. Hopefully the weather holds.

We got good news last night and that is that Dad and Shirley will meet us in Las Vegas over the Thanksgiving Day holiday. Unfortunately they don't fly in until Saturday, so we'll only get one night with them. They couldn't get into the Polo Towers until Saturday and they are averse to paying for hotels. Jennifer is thrilled and we are planning a pizza and game night for that Saturday at Jennifer and John's house. Jennifer is doing well with the pregnancy although she told Darla she often feels like a turtle when she sleeps on her back and tries to roll over to get out of bed. I've never been pregnant (imagine that) , but Darla has and could relate to the experience and had a good laugh. I know that is hard to imagine, Darla having a good laugh, but try.

Our dog, Buddy, is getting older and spends a tremendous amount of time sleeping and he tends to stretch and hobble when he first gets up from lying down. There is a dog on the golf course who is about the same age as Buddy. He is a black lab and we used to play games with him as we waited to tee off on number 3. He'd bring us his knotted rope and pass it through the fence and we'd throw it and he'd run. Now he sits at the window of his house and slowly looks at us as we call for him. It seems at times that he gives us a little nod, but his spirit is no longer there. It's sad, but I see some of that in Buddy as well. Occasionally he gets excited about something and jumps up and down, but then sleeps for two hours afterward as if it took all of his strength to put out that energy. We still take him on walks every once in a while and he used to pull us and it was struggle for the whole length of the walk. Now he walks right beside us and is anxious to get back home when we are done. I think Darla and I will take him out tonight as we have a night off from life group.

Darla continues to work hard at her Silpada sterling silver business. She has parties all of this month and won't slow down until the first of December. In the mean time, as she has parties, I'm out playing golf. I played Saturday with the RGC board members as we had a Saturday morning breakfast meeting and then golf afterwards. I set up a high -low best ball golf game with 16 players. The split for high handicappers to low was 16 and we ended up with eight teams of high-low golfers and took the net best ball of the team. Everyone threw $5 in the pot and we had $80 which was split $50 to the winning team, $20 to second and $10 to third. The winning teams both shot 62 and we had to go to a card playoff to determine the winner. They both had the same score on the back nine and it came down to the last six holes to determine the winner. My team shot 65. I shot 40+42=82 which is right on my handicap. Sunday was the Past president's golf tournament and I shot 40+40=80 for a net 70. I had to leave for a meeting at church, but it should be in the money. I have a goal now not to ever have a double bogey. If however, I do have a double I have to manage a birdie to counter the double-bogey. Sunday, after a 40 on the front, I had a birdie on number 10 only to follow that up with a double on 11. It's not suppose to work in the opposite. I then doubled number 13 and covered that with a birdie on number 16, which was our last hole as we started on number 17 in the shotgun start at 7:30. It was a great weekend weather wise and golf wise. Bob shot a 73 yesterday for a net 68, so I was playing in high cotton with my group. Boyd had 78 and Bud shot 77.

The office continues to shine. I was talking to Dad last night and shared with him that momentum is an amazing animal. When it is going bad, it seems impossible to turn it around, but likewise, when it is going good, the momentum seems to carry over from one month to the next. I am often criticized because our expenses in Sacramento are high compared to Modesto (we are their back office and type the policies, handle the accounting, do all the file work and claims activity, etc.). Well, we just had our highest net retained month ever for the Sacramento office in October, bringing in almost $155,000 after expenses. Modesto brought in another $57,000 and we came close to our biggest month ever as a combined profit center. I'm taking the gang out to lunch on Wednesday.

Well work awaits. I've had three underwriters in my office as I was working on this chatting me up, so the salt mine awaits. I'll have tales of La Jolla and Torrey Pines next Monday. Ciao.

Back from Lake Tahoe and a short vacation.

We only took one picture on our short week in Lake Tahoe which is odd for Darla, but we were both in a total relaxation mood. You can also see that I've added pictures of the "new" living room which is now a milk chocolate color and, strangely, I sit watching television and end up craving a Hershey's bar. Go figure. She also bought the new clock, cross and Italian banner to dress up the room and add some class to our home. The cross is huge and I'm concerned that we are now Greek Orthodox or something, but Darla says that crosses are very "in vogue" at the moment. If she left it up to me, I'd have the Three Stooges golf poster hanging above the fireplace. Note the new white mantle on the fireplace. Double click on the pictures to see a larger view.

Again, Tahoe was very relaxing and I really needed the downtime after the trip to Detroit. The weather was absolutely perfect with daytime highs in the mid seventies and overnight lows in the mid twenties. I actually ended up with a slight sunburn on Tuesday. Darla went out scouting out a couple of the local boutiques for a nail appointment on Wednesday and she wanted to be able to set up her Silpada jewelry at the spa for the day and sell some items. I relaxed at the resort and ended up down at the pool with my book and a towel. I called Darla as I left the room to head down to the pool and she said she was on her way. That was 12:15 PM and I read for a bit and finally shut my eyes and slept. Darla ended up back at the resort at 2:30 PM and I ended up with a sunburn. The rays in Lake Tahoe are so intense because of the elevation. I had called Darla to remind her to grab the sunscreen from my golf bag and bring it to the pool. Oops. We ended up playing tennis, eating out, gambling and relaxing during the week. I met Bob, my friend from church and the golf club, at the resort Wednesday morning and we drove in to Carson City to pick up one of his friends (Jim) and play golf at his country club in Washoe Valley near the Montreaux Country Club. His course was difficult (a 134 slope versus our club's 121). My 9 index netted me 11 strokes at his club and I shot 44+42=86 on the day. Bob also shot 86. It was a perfect day and I enjoyed Jim and the club. Jim came down to Roseville a couple of weeks ago and played in our Invitational with Bob and they played in a foursome with Pete and I. Pete is my number one underwriter from work.

We had an evacuation on Thursday morning as the fire alarm went off at about 9:30 AM. It turns out that one of the guests had poured hot grease from the stove into a basin of water in the sink and sparked a fire. It set off the alarms and we all met in the parking lot. We had met another couple the night before in the hot tub. The husband had apologized as he slipped out of his trunks after donning a robe. I was sitting in the tub at the time and told him I was glad he had on a long robe as he squirmed out of his wet trunks. He laughed and putting on a Swedish accent, said, "Ya, we're just Europeans." That morning he made his way over to Darla and I and said that they'd had a methane explosion in their suite after using the restroom that morning. Funny guy.

We returned home on Friday night as Darla wanted a chance to relax in her own bed after being away from home all week. She left this morning for Monterey and is at a home party for Silpada as I write this. Darla had some good luck at the casinos and hit a Royal Flush for $200 on the nickel machines on Friday night. It was good to see as I had little luck all week, finally hitting a Straight Flush at the Nugget in North Lake Tahoe on Friday afternoon for $32.60 on a 25 cent bet on the nickel video poker.

I have sent a request through the San Francisco Exchange Company for a week in Las Vegas over Thanksgiving. Jennifer has invited us up for Thanksgiving and we will drive up on Wednesday the 21st of November and stay until Sunday. We plan to ask Dad and Shirley if they want to join us as well, if they can get away so soon after the trip to Austin. In fact, they are still in Austin and will fly home to Canada on Tuesday. Jennifer gave me a couple of hotel choices and we will use those as a backup in case the exchange doesn't come through. I hope we can get in on the exchange as it will only cost us $129 with the exchange instead of $140 A NIGHT at the hotel.

I am writing the blog on Saturday night partly because I have the time, but mostly because I have one of the Senior VPs from Burns in on Monday along with Harvey. I actually worked pretty closely with Irene in Detroit as I was on her team in the sales training and we were in competition with eight other teams. Our team was made up of Branch Managers and I think the goal was to get us acquainted with Irene, who is in charge of Branch Development and has been on the job a little over a year. I had the crew clean up the office and had the office management company set up to have the floors cleaned and polished prior to the visit. Hopefully the office will show well as this is Irene's first visit to our office. Harvey's office is in the middle of converting to Imaging and she is out to work with San Francisco, but asked to come out and see Ken's office as well on her trip. C'est la vie.

I played golf today in the 3rd Diamond Tourney, It is a club within our club as there is a Diamond upgrade that buys us six free rounds, exclusive tournaments with industry vendors (today was Srixon), a hat, a windshirt and ten range tokens all for $50. It's a good deal. I met with Scott, our club pro before the round and he said that he is going to give me free golf next year for every tournament we have. it is a savings to the club of about $360 as they were going to pay my green fees in 12 events. Scott has agreed to pay for all of my golf this next year, so I'm very pleased with his generous offer. I shot 39+42=81, for a net 71 and third place in today's tournament. I played with Bob, Boyd and Robert (our pro shop starter). They shot, 79, 78 and 78 respectively, so my 81 was a reflection of the talent I was playing with.

Tomorrow, Darla will be home about 2 PM and we have a Halloween event to attend at the church tomorrow night. it is Trunk or Treat, where cars are dressed up and the trunk is full of candy for the kids and each car is part of a booth with games and fun. Darla and I will work an hour at one of the booths and hand out candy. It should be fun and is an outreach of our life group.

The church continues to struggle with the resignation of about half of our church leaders. They had asked our pastor to step down and he refused, leading to a mass exodus. Pastor Rick is being tutored by the dean of our local Christian college and being held accountable by two of the senior pastors in the church. The whole disagreement has to do with Rick's management style. Apparently, he is a bit of a micro-manager and the staff rebelled. It is a mess, but the dissenters are leaving and a new staff will emerge with an emboldened and chastened pastor, who is moving the church past this event and hopefully we will end up stronger through all of this. That is the prayer. The life group leaders, including Darla and I will meet with Rick next Sunday and I'm anxious to hear what he has to say.

Well, I have a movie waiting with my name on it, so i will bid you adieu. Ciao.