Springing into Spring

Spring has been thrust upon us with the annual pushing ahead of the clocks to save daylight. I'll wonder about the value of this whole exercise tomorrow when i get up for work, but will revel in it when I get home and still have an hour of sunlight before the darkness sneaks back in like a teenager into the house after midnight. Michael, Jennifer's beau, was complaining about it on FB today and I told him that no one works Sundays. Of course he and Jennifer were struggling at work after a night on the Vegas strip last night.

Spring also brings us Spring Training and we were able to make it out to the Giant's game against Texas on Monday night. The World Series champs won (AGAIN) 4-1. Both Texas and SF are having very good success in the desert this year and I expect to see both of them back in the playoffs this year. I put the Giants shirt picture above on FB and Randy commented that the Giants should just worry about repeating and not the team they beat, but at $25 a pop, the Giants are making some money selling these shirts. I didn't buy one, instead buying a faux jersey of Tim Lincecum (The Freak) and a World Series Champions shirt that lists all of the players on the winning team last year. We had a blast at the game.

We flew out Sunday morning, got our luggage and a Ford Edge from Thrifty and drove out to The Legacy Resort in Western Phoenix. We met two of our underwriters from Scottsdale and played the course after a nice breakfast on the deck overlooking the first tee and 18th green. I played okay continuing my good drives and average wedge play for an 86. The weather was awesome, about 75 degrees with high thin clouds and a slight breeze. Sunday night we met our contract underwriter and the Regional Manager from Scottsdale a=fro dinner at Don and Charlies Steakhouse, a Scottsdale institution and a bar and restaurant with some of the best sports memorabilia around. The walls are covered with jerseys, signed photos, golf equipment, baseballs, footballs, basketballs, etc. All signed and stored in glass cases. It reminded me of a Hard Rock Cafe for sports junkies. Very nice and the prime rib was outstanding.

Pete and I stayed in the Colony Insurance corporate apartment and they had a nice bottle of Merlot awaiting us. The apartment is two bedrooms with large walk in closets and two large bathrooms. The apartment is stocked with sheets, towels, blankets, toiletries, food and drink, books, movies and plenty of wine and beer. Very nice. it was a comfortable stay for our three days and we really appreciated the hospitality. As I said before, we write $4,000,000 with the company and are one of the largest agencies for them on the west coast. The VP that runs the Scottsdale branch was back in home office in Virginia when we visited and he called to apologize. He and the company President are coming out to visit us the end of this month. We got back to the apartment about 8:30 and I went in to call Darla and when I came out after 9:00 PM, Pete had already gone to bed. Quite the party animal.

Monday we met our Markel underwriter and Manager for breakfast at a little place called the Breakfast Place and it was excellent. We sat out in the sun waiting for them to get there and watched the Giants fans all starting to get up and greet the day. The downtown area of Scottsdale is Giants country this time of year as they train and play at Scottsdale Stadium in downtown Scottsdale. The Diamondbacks who used to train in Tuscon moved into a brand new facility in North Scottsdale this year, but hat stadium is probably 20 minutes from downtown Scottsdale. Pete and I then went into Colony, visited all of our underwriters and had a meeting with the Underwriting Director and then headed to lunch. We ate witht he Colony gang at Zipps, a local hamburger restaurant that was also amazing. Good food and large drinks (iced tea) which is nice. We went from there over to Scottsdale Insurance to see our underwriters. Susan, our Colony underwriter, told her they'd pick us up at 4:30 at the apartment. We spent about 90 minutes at Scottsdale, although our Underwriting Director wasn't there and had made a trip to Hawaii to visit agents. She will be in my office on the 24th of this month. We saw Emery who was my boss at Republic Western. He has been moved to a Special Assistant position and is working on special projects for the management team and planning his retirement. Emery was the Underwriting Director for 6 years.

We had dinner with Susan and another underwriter at 5:00 PM at Bandera's , a steakhouse in the downtown area of Scottsdale and another excellent choice. Scottsdale has some great restaurants. Both Pete and I were stuffed from eating so much, but put on a happy face and I ate a stuffed chicken breast and some homemade cornbread. It was excellent. We then went off to the game which started at 7 PM.

Wednesday, we checked out of the apartment and dropped the keys off back at Colony and then rushed up to North Scottsdale to meet Patti, my underwriter from RepWest, that is now working for Seneca. We met at the Breakfast Joynt, another tremendous restaurant and a specialist in breakfast items. I had a ham and cheese omelet and Pete and I got caught up on what is going on in Patti's life and also on what is hot at Seneca. From there, we used Pete's Android to direct us to Burlington, where we had a 9:30 meeting. After several wrong turns, we found the office. The meeting went well and we agreed on several issues that have been impeding our efforts to write business with them. From there we headed over to Orange Tree Resort for golf with Mike, our Underwriter and Mike, the Branch Manager from Burns' Scottsdale office. We had a great time and I shot 85 and had a lot of laughs with the group.

We finished up at 3:30 and headed over to turn the rental back in and get to the airport for our 6:05 flight. Pete's Android took us the wrong way on Highway 51 and we had to call Patti to get directions to the airport. We made it in record time using the car pool lanes, but found out that we had been bumped to a 6:30 flight heading to San Diego and changing planes to Sacramento. That got us in at 9:45, but we weren't up for flying all night. The agent got us on a 9:00 PM direct flight to Sacramento that got us in at 10:00 PM. We checked in and headed to Chili's for dinner.

It was a great trip. We got in two games of golf, a Spring Training game, too many meals to count and five carrier meetings. A whirlwind, but also a well planned marketing trip that will pay dividends for us. When we got in at 10:15 (we were late getting out of Phoenix as we were 23rd in line to take off when we got to the tarmac), my golf clubs were not on the carousel. Pete's were there, but not mine. It brought back memories of Denver and the horrible experience of losing my clubs ( I still haven't found a 3 wood I can hit with the confidence of the one I lost). I schlepped over to the baggage office for Southwest and my clubs were there. They came in on the plane we were supposed to take at 6:05 and sat there for anyone to steal before the airline brought them to their office. My luck with airlines and golf clubs is not good.

We talked to Jennifer this weekend and Samantha had a fever last night which broke and she was feeling better today. Sam was with John. Jennifer and Michael took advantage of a Maggiano's gift card we gave Mike at Christmas time and had dinner last night on the strip. They are both doing well. I added some pictures that Jennifer sent us of Sam playing with one of her stuffed animals and also playing hide and seek with Mom.

I am working on reviews this week at work, so pray for me. I tell it like it is in reviews. If you are doing well, you get praise, if you have room for improvement, you hear about it. Fun times. I'll write more next week. Thank you for the birthday wishes. I went out and played golf and shot an 81. On top of that, the pro "comped" my round and the guys bought all my drinks. You can't beat that with a stick. Be well. Ciao.