Goodbye Summer!

It was likely our last 100 degree weekend in Sacramento with a high of 104 degrees on Saturday. It is not unusual for such hot temperatures late in the year, but the average high temperature for this time of year is about 88 degrees. I used the hot weather to do a last good cleaning of the tile on the pool and shut off the waterfalls until next Spring. The waterfalls are great and add a nice touch to the backyard, but they tend to get quite a bit of calcium buildup around the tiles below the waterfalls and I can only truly clean the tile from inside the pool. The pool water had dropped to 75 degrees and it was a little cool in the water, but it bounced back up to 82 degrees this weekend with the heat and I was able to get back in the pool and do some cleaning. The boys took down the outside gazebo before they left for Cal Poly and I have to take down the chairs and umbrellas eventually. It is still nice enough to occasionally eat out side, so I'm going to wait on that. It is now completely shaded on the pool by 5:00 PM and the sun is down by about 7:40 PM. The days are growing shorter and soon we will turn back the clocks and make it dark early at night.

I played golf in the sweltering heat on Saturday and had my best round of the year. I wilted a bit on the back nine, but had six pars, two birdies and a bogey on the front nine for a one under par 35. I parred the first two holes and then had three straight bogeys before hitting a par, birdie, bogey and finishing (limping home) with a double bogey for a 41 and 76 on my round. It was in a tournament and I took second low net with a 65. Some 71 year old 12 handicapper shot a 75. Boyd had low gross with a 73. It was a great round of golf and I wonder how I'd have finished if I wasn't walking the course in 104 degree temperatures.

Our trip to Denver comes up in two weeks and I plan to prepare for the golf by taking a trip with Bob, Boyd and Neil up to Jack Nicklaus' Old Greenwood course in Truckee next Sunday. The course is at 6500 feet and is 7518 yards from the tips. We will play it at the 6457 yard configuration, which is still a challenge with a 564 yard par five (that would play 631 yards from the tips). Take a look at the website: http://www.oldgreenwoodgolf.com/golf/proto/tahoemountainclub/
Click on the gallery and look at the course. It is equally as beautiful as the pictures. I played the course back in 2008 on a trip to Reno with one of my agents, but we made the mistake of playing it at 6,944 yards and we struggled. I shot 89 and had to make a par on the last hole to break 90. My agent kept saying the ball flies farther in the high altitude. it does, but not that much farther. my home course is 6200 yards from the tips. Hopefully, the day at Old Greenwood will prepare me for the course in Colorado. Darla and I look forward to the trip.

Things are getting busy for us as we approach October with the trip to Denver and then a trip to Monterey over Halloween where the golf group will play Poppy Hills in Pebble Beach and Old Del Monte in Monterey. I will venture out with some of my buds and play Bayonette at the old Fort Ord military installation. It was completely renovated in 2007 and 2008 and I look forward to playing that one. I also have the Manager's meeting in Detroit the first of November and then we are off to Nuevo Vallarta in mid November with Dad and Shirley, Darryl and Cheryl and Neil and Lilly. That schedule seems to fit Dad and Shirley better than Darla and I.

Darla and I were in church today and we had a guest worship leader Wayburn Dean, former member of the Christian group Acapella. Our worship leader stepped down last month and is getting a divorce from his wife. Wayburn is on fire for the Lord and it was a delight listening to him today and worshipping with him. He is a candidate to take the worship leader position and I hope he takes it. I heard Wayburn and his group in concert probably ten years ago and have one of their Cd's. The sermon today continued the series on icebergs in our life and is on the theme of the Titanic, an unsinkable ship that hit an iceberg. The series is about the threats to our Christian life: temptation, deception and this week, addictions. They showed a clip of an interview between James Dobson and Ted Bundy in the night before Bundy was executed and it was chilling to hear him talk about his life growing up in a Christian home and how he got into pornography that kept escalating until he killed 39 women. The point that Bundy made is that he talked to other inmates who had killed and raped women and 100% of them were in to pornography as well. With the Internet, our children are exposed to it constantly. It is scary.

Darla talked to Earl and Frances and they had a great week up in Tahoe. The weather was incredible and they even ran into some friends from paradise while they were there and had dinner with them at the Lakeside Inn. They spend a lot of time sight seeing and spent time at lake Tahoe. It sounds like they really enjoyed the trip.

I hope to have Earl and Frances over next weekend and have earl help me put in a screen partition over the front door. We want to be able to open the front door and let the cool air come in and move down the hallway into our bedroom and living areas. I've not put one in so far because we have a very nice wood front door and I didn't want to cover it up with a storm door. Earl bought a roller screen door from Home depot and installed it on his double wood front door and loves it. I'm also looking at having a whole house fan installed this Fall to help cool the house down on hot days. Everyone that has one loves it.

I played in a charity golf tournament on Thursday and my team shot a 15 under par 57. Everything went right for us in the round, we sunk long putts, chipped in from off the green, were on par fives in two. Our 57 was good for fourth place in the tournament. Unbelievable. Darla had a party that night and wouldn't be home until ten. The tournament wrapped up at 7:15 and was right next door to the Thunder Valley casino. I went over with $50 and came home with $577. I wasn't there for an hour. I was playing a quarter machine and putting in one and two coins. i hit a couple of four of a kinds and had my pot up to $170 and on my first bet of four coins, I hit four aces with a four for 1,600 quarters ($400). I immediately cashed out and was home by 8:45 Pm. Nice, eh?

Well, that's it for this week. I may work on the blog early next week because of the Truckee golf, but whatever, I will be back at it next week, Jennifer, send me some videos of Samantha!! Be well and keep living your life for Jesus. Ciao.

A Little Lake Tahoe is Good for the Soul

This update will be quick as Darla and I got home from Lake Tahoe about 5:30 this afternoon and I laid down to watch the start of the Monday Night Football game and woke up during halftime. I know if I don't get to this today, it won't get done as I'll be at work tomorrow until about 8:30 getting caught up from a day off of work. The trip was tremendously relaxing and I feel actually pretty relaxed. I have been overly stressed lately, running my desk, the Sacramento office, the Modesto office and an underwriting desk in Modesto. I've really felt the stress in my neck and shoulders as the entire yoke of my body is sore and I've even had some stress headaches lately. I know this sounds like an employee about to put in for a stress related leave of absence, but I wanted to put into context how relaxing this weekend was.

The condo in Tahoe is located in the Tahoe Summit development on the Nevada side of Heavenly Valley Ski Resort, right off the Kingsbury Grade in Stateline, Nevada. The condos are about 28 years old and unfortunately four stories without an elevator. Darla's dad, Earl just turned 70, but is in great shape from cutting wood on the church's wood cutting ministry (they provide firewood for the elderly and those in need of free wood). Darla's Mom, Frances, has a bad knee and the 60 steps that it took us from the parking lot up to the room was starting to wear on her by the time we left. The good news is that the condo has some wonderful views of the Carson Valley and the eastern slopes of Heavenly Valley. The condo has five buildings and the unit we had was a loft unit on the top floor and consists of three bedrooms and can sleep up to eight. We had six Saturday night as Alicia and Don joined Earl , Frances, Darla and I up in Tahoe.

We met Earl and Frances at the Jax by the Trax diner in Truckee on Saturday afternoon. They had stopped for lunch earlier, but came by and had a sweet roll and coffee with us as we finished our lunch. Jax is an old boxcar style diner right next to the railroad tracks in Truckee. From there we drove up to Stateline through Highway 28 around the eastern side of Lake Tahoe. Lake Tahoe is an absolute jewel of a lake with three distinct colors, a golden green near the shore, an emerald color off shore and a deep blue deeper in the lake.

We went out to dinner at the Chart House in Stateline and watched the sun set over Lake Tahoe. Dinner was excellent with a large salad bar, a good (yet thin) clam chowder that had won awards in Boston, and a great New York strip and Coconut prawns dinner that Darla and I split a plate of. We played cards (3-13) Saturday night and tried weakly to get some interest up in going to the casinos. The condos are located on a dark road about 10 miles south of Stateline off the Kingsbury grade and we decided to hit the sack early.

Sunday we got up early and went to Heidi's for breakfast. Heidi's is the breakfast joint in Lake Tahoe that we like and Don and Alicia had eaten there before. The food is great and although we had a bit of a wait, well worth it. Darla and the ladies went out to the outlet mall after breakfast while Earl, Don and I went to the Cool September Days car show at the Horizon. We saw some very nice cars including a $150,000 1967 Shelby Cobra that was the hit of the show. Carroll Shelby actually owned a Ford dealership in Lake Tahoe in 1968 and sold it in the 90's. There were plenty of 1957 Chevy's and some tremendous Apache trucks and even an original first run Harley Davidson motorcycle from the first year of production. The held gravity drags at the back of the casino that were a hoot. A VW beetle beat a custom Freightliner for the title.

Don and Alicia headed home after that and we went back to the condo with Earl and Frances after stopping to show them the Tahoe Beach and Ski club condo that we've stayed at a couple of times. We took some pictures at the beach as you can see above. We went out to dinner at the Lakeside Inn in Stateline and all of us enjoyed the $10.99 Prime Rib dinner. Earl signed up for a Player's Club card and got a free birthday dinner and a cocktail that Darla and Frances drank for him. We headed back to the condo and watched as the Cowboys self destructed in their loss to the Giants 33-31. We then played a couple of hands of 3-13 and headed to bed.

This morning we enjoyed one of Earl's breakfasts. Darla and her folks had pancakes with strawberry preserves and whipped cream. My stomach doesn't do sweet early in the morning and I had eggs and sausage. Darla and I took off a little after ten and stopped at the casinos and got our gambling fix in, only losing about $60 in the process and having a good time. We stopped for lunch in Tahoe City after stopping at the overlook at Emerald Bay where we had our picture taken by some tourists. The drive home after that was the drive from Hell as we hit construction traffic on both Highway 89 ( a half hour wait ) and Highway 80, finally getting home at 5:30.

This is short, but it is late and I want to relax with Darla. I did play golf early Saturday morning and shot 82 to Boyd's 71 and Matt's 72 and we were off to Tahoe after that. I hope you are all doing well and leading lives that we can all be proud of. Be well. Ciao.

Opening Weekend of NFL Football 2009

It is the Kickoff weekend of the NFL season, just another sign that Summer is slowly slipping away. That, and the rain yesterday pretty well solidified the concept. It was nothing more than a light drizzle that interrupted the tranquility of the golf course and some thunder far off in the foothills that sounded more ominous than it was. I could live in a tropical climate as I do enjoy Summer more than any season. Fall and Spring are close seconds and I abhor Winter as the light stealing, cold, miserable two months (in Northern California) that rob us of our will to go on. The pictures above were made as part of Jennifer's new Flip video camera that has a snapshot feature. You can break the movies down to individual frames and capture those as jpeg images on your computer. We sure enjoyed having Jennifer and Samantha home.

the boys will pack up and head back to Cal Poly this week, both to begin their junior years. Daniel is three years behind David, but much of David's junior college work didn't transfer over to his Architecture major and he fell behind. His 5 year major will take him seven years to accomplish. Daniel is heading back to a house that he will share with some guys from his dorm and David is still trying to arrange housing. We always joke that David should just stay in the Architecture lab because he's there seven days a week anyway. Funny how reality often collides with humor. He is looking to move into a room off campus with two other Architecture students, but hasn't arranged the particulars yet. Daniel will bring his truck with him this year and will load up my old gas barbecue to use while he is in San Luis Obispo. David finishes up his job with his old architecture firm (they brought him back in August to help out during vacations). Daniel will finish up the to do list his Dad has had him working on all Summer and turn in his serf badge and probably be happy to get back to SLO and out of the indentured servant business.

My job has been wearing a bit lately and I accepted an offer from Darryl to fly out to Denver for a long weekend of golf, food and family. Darla and I will fly in on Friday October 9th and stay until Monday October 12th. I look forward to getting away, playing some golf with Darryl and spending time with Darryl and Cheryl visiting and relaxing. He said he plans an outing up to the Rocky Mountain National Park. We will breathe some fresh air, hit the ball extra long n the mile high air and hopefully return relaxed and reinvigorated. I am two days in Modesto a week right now and the commute and disorganization is getting to me. We are slowly sorting out the problems in the office (Pete is there two days a week as well), but it is a big job and it remains to be seen what ends up happening in that office. I have a few candidates lined up to interview.

Today was the first day of our club championship at the Golf Club and the first that I have missed in about eight years. Darla and I will be in Lake Tahoe next weekend hosting Darla's parents, Earl and Francis to a week's stay at the Tahoe Summit Village up in Stateline, Nevada. The condo is a two bedroom condo with an extra loft bedroom, a living room, full kitchen and a wood burning fireplace. It is Earl's 70th birthday and we will go up Saturday and Sunday to enjoy it with them and then leave them the rest of the week to their devices. Again, I look forward to getting away.

I did play golf yesterday and struggled around to a 42+42=84. I was hitting the ball well off the tee, but struggling with my short game. I even lost all sides of the 6+6+6 competition with the guys and lost $15. Darren bought me a beer and Bob bought me lunch. It's good to have friends, eh? I'll play Saturday morning in the first tee time and then Darla and I are off to Lake Tahoe, where we will wear light coats and long pants and build a fire in the fireplace. It should be nice.

The blog will be late next week as I will be gone, so don't look for it before Monday at the earliest.

Jennifer called me this week on my way back from Modesto and picked my brain on football as she is in a fantasy league. I'm in three leagues this year, including one at work. My team name? Corner Office of course. I haven't been able to reach her to see how it turned out.

Well, we are all well. I'm happy to see the boys heading back to Cal Poly. The quicker they get done, the quicker Darla and I get a huge raise (We won't be paying tuition for two guys). I'm hoping they both get jobs next Summer. They need it for the money and need to stop depending on mom and Dad for their support at the age of 22 and 20. I didn't really feel independent until i was paying my own way and making my own decisions. They will realize that as well when they get there and wish they'd done it sooner.

Well, be well this week. I believe that there is yet another game on TV that awaits me. Darla is doing well with her three jobs and I even get to see her a couple of days a week. imagine that. Ciao.

Labor Day 2009

Labor Day. The unofficial end of Summer and I'm not ready. I enjoy Summer more than any other season. I enjoy the long days and the warm Summer nights. I enjoy the pool having water that is almost too warm, the excellent conditions on the golf courses, the family times that come with good weather and the vacations and long weekends that add to the fun. The days are getting shorter and the nights are cooler. The pool water has dropped back to 80 degrees and cooler and some of the infernal leaves from the park across the street have started to drop from the trees and end up in my alcove at the front of the house and stuck in my bushes.

We have had a good weekend this weekend with some pool time, some golf for me, and a night out with friends last night at Benihana's. I am a member of their Captains table and get offers all the time. Their offer in September to celebrate their 45th anniversary is Their Rocky's Choice meal for $19.64 (they started in 1964). So , we went out last night, drank a few Asahi's and enjoyed shrimp appetizers, onion soup, oriental salad, chicken and steak cooked on the teppanyaki table. We had a few laughs and enjoyed each other's company. The group got a big kick out of the fact that I thought diverticulitis was what happens when a skin diver surfaces from the ocean too fast (it's the Bends).

Bob and Vicki picked us up and drove us to dinner and they have a new 2007 Tahoe LTZ. New, of course, to them. it only has 30,00 miles on it and is a champagne color. beautiful car. Bob has always been a new car guy until he heard my explanation of buying newer model cars with about 20,00 miles on the odometer. I said that I'm inherently frugal (my word) and can't stand driving a new car off a lot and losing $10,000. He apparently took my words to heart and bought used this time. The car looks absolutely brand new.

I noticed a break in my front window when Jennifer was visiting. Apparently some Yahoo with a bb gun shot at our house putting a hole in our front window and the bb was still in the dual pane frame. What possesses some punk that doesn't even own a house or likely a car to do that? I'd have preferred that he paintball my garage than shoot at my house with a gun.

I am taking the club championship off this year. It starts next Sunday, but the following weekend we are hosting Darla's parents, Earl and Frances to a week in a condo in Lake Tahoe. We had some extra RCI time on the books and booked a two bedroom condo with a third loft bedroom up near Heavenly Valley. Darla and i are going to drive up Saturday morning (the 19th) and meet them for lunch and then check into the condo. We will stay over Saturday and Sunday nights and then they'll have the condo for the rest of the week.

I did play this weekend and had a great front nine on Saturday. I shot 82, but had a 37 on the front nine (YOU do the math for the back). I left the course frustrated and stewed Sunday. I decided to get out and play early this morning and play the par 60 course in Elverta. We teed off (mel, Boyd and I) at 6:50 this morning and were off the course by 9:45 AM. I shot 36+32=68 and feel much better now than I did on Monday. Sometimes you just have to erase a bad memory. I played with Boyd, Bob, and our current club champion, Jay, on Saturday. one of us had a hole-in-one and you know I would have lead with that in my blog, so congratulations to Jay. It is the second hole-in-one that I have witnessed in my group and I enjoyed my part of a pitcher of Fat Tire beer at the end of our round bought by jay. The club pays $150 for his drinks and I think he spent short of $100, so he actually made some money. We had the third to last tee time, so most of the guys were gone when we came in at 5:30 Saturday night.

We are off to a backyard BBQ this afternoon at Charlie and Freida's, friends from the golf club. We will get there about three and stay until 6 or 6:30 and have some part of the evening to ourselves.

I had a rough week at work and had to terminate a couple of employees this week. I'm now in the Modesto office two days a week and it is slowly wearing me out. I hope to have a replacement in place within a month. Our numbers in Sacramento are stellar and I took the gang out to lunch at Chevy's last Wednesday.

Finally, Darla and I are toying with a trip to Denver to see Darryl and Cheryl in early October. The cost of flights to Denver are cheap and Darryl is dangling the carrot of golf at Arrowhead Golf Club in Littleton. I hope to talk to him today and see when would be a good time to come out and then look into booking our flights.

That is it for this week. Be good, love one another and look to the Lord for answers everyday in your life. Ciao.