Leaving for Vegas next weekend!

It will be a fun weekend next week with Dad and Shirley and Jennifer and Samantha. Jennifer was supposed to be down in Vegas starting this weekend, but decided to delay a week because McKenny couldn't make it this weekend and she needs help getting moved into her new apartment. They will get there Thursday night and we arrive Friday morning. Samantha is, of course, in school, so McKenny and Jennifer will do most of the move on Friday. I will try to bring my notebook computer with me and do a blog entry while we are there. We leave Friday morning for Vegas and don't return until Monday night. I then have two days of work and then my CEO will be here for his annual visit on Thursday. He will fly in to Lincoln on Thursday morning and fly back to LA on Thursday afternoon. We have a meeting in the office at 10 AM and then lunch with one of our retailers at noon. We have to meet with our landlord after that and his flight back to Los Angeles is like 5 PM. It is always stress inducing as the staff is jumpy.

I leave That Thursday night for our annual golf junket to Carmel. Darla and I will stay in Capitola Thursday night and I play Pajaro Friday morning. Pajaro is a championship course in Watsonville, CA. Saturday we play Pasadero, another championship layout in Carmel Valley and Sunday is Quail Lodge also in Carmel Valley and Sunday night the drive home to Roseville. Busy times ahead.

This weekend is just about in the books and it was unique in that I didn't play any golf. Not that I didn't have plans, but a freak storm blew in on Saturday with high winds and torrential rains. We had small creek flood advisories and I spent a portion of the morning prior to the rain clearing out my gutters and downspouts. I had just finished the last downspout in the backyard and there were two claps of thunder and then a hard rainfall that had the gutters overflowing just from the sheer amount of rain coming down that the downspouts couldn't stay on top of.

I did have a tee time at 7 AM, but Neil had already texted me to let me know that he was OUT and Big John let me know at Poker that he was not feeling great and would take a "rain check" I sent a text to Darren and told him it looked like golf was off due to the storm about 11 PM from the poker game. I hadn't heard back from Darren when I got up at 6:15 and texted him a note saying "in or Out?" Still no response, so I went back to bed. He finally sent me a text at 7:30 saying "I was at the course, I guess we are OUT? I didn't have my phone." No sh&t, Sherlock. I would have played as the weather was okay in the morning, just a little breezy and overcast. The rain came in about 1 PM with a vengeance.

Darla had an event Saturday morning at one of the malls, a classic car show that she had a booth at. She got there, set up  and the cars did not show. They had all been called and told to stay away until Sunday. Darla was there for about three hours and saw almost no foot traffic and packed up and headed home. When she got home she couldn't find her ipad and was really concerned that someone grabbed it. Darla, being Darla, decided that if it was gone, that she wouldn't be upset, but would have faith that God would provide. She had left her Easy Up and one box there and hoped that her ipad was in that, locked up. She checked today and it wasn't and true to her word, she let God take her sorrow from losing the ipad away. Just then something caught her eye under the driver's seat of her Explorer. It turned out to be her ipad, but Darla swears she checked under the seat three times and it wasn't there. She is convinced that God provided for her because of her faith in Him. praise God, eh?

By the way, my friend, John was at poker Friday night and complaining about his cold and that it was really getting him down. He won a little and felt better, but begged off golf in the morning. His wife Camille, called us today to tell us that they took John into the hospital today and that he has pneumonia. He is playing with us in Carmel, so is on bed rest until he gets better so that he can join us.

I did play golf on Thursday in a scramble for one of our suppliers at work. We played at Lincoln hills in Lincoln and it was Matt, Andy, Pete and I. We finished at 8 under par, but it was a 6 hour round of golf and I left before the awards lunch as I had too much to do at work. I was really hitting the ball well on Thursday and looking forward to this weekend. I know that I will not play next weekend, so this may have been my last chance before the three day trip to Monterey. Hopefully I can sneak out one afternoon with some agents and get in a round of golf.

Football was good today with Dallas running over the St Louis Rams and an upset by the Colts over the 49ers. We also saw the Giants and Redskins lose, so Dallas is alone in first place. My coworkers are planning a football night at the local sports bar on Thursday night. I'll probably go over for a little while, but it is two 1-2 teams playing each other in the Rams and 49ers. It could be a little dicey with each team on the verge of blowing their seasons.

Darla and I are in a couple's Bible study at church on Wednesday nights and we are getting in touch with each other's needs and wants and it has been an eye opener for me. Darla wants me to show more outward affection to her boys and I guess I am a little stand offish sometimes. They are both struggling to make their way in the world and need support from all of us. Sometimes I get a little too focused on Jennifer's life and forget that the boys are working through some of the same issues she is.

I went Friday and made contact with a new medical doctor through Sutter Health. We have lost our Kaiser coverage with Darla quitting her job with Alta. I had to stop and get some medications and paid $30 for a one month supply of meds. That same medication would have been $15 for a 90 day supply with Kaiser. I did get hooked up with the mail supply pharmacy and will get future medications at $12 for a three month supply or $36 for all three medications. This will take an adjustment. The good part, for me, is that the medical offices are across the street from my office and include a lab for blood work. I have high cholesterol and have to have my blood drawn pretty routinely.

I had a guy over at 8:30 this morning to aerate the lawn.  I then washed my car and fertilized the lawn  then went over to Denny's for a senior omelet and iced tea ($10 with tip) before settling down to watch the games today.  I did have Tru Green (Darryl's company) doing the work, but they charge $90 and I found a local guy who did it for $49. We have to cut back with Darla transitioning to just Silpada.

Just a coupe of pictures from Earl's birthday celebration last weekend.. There will be plenty of pictures of my favorite granddaughter and dad and Shirley, so stay tuned.

That is it for this week, but I will try to get in a blog entry next weekend from Vegas and then it will be late  the following week because of our Monterey golf trip. I hope you are all doing great and living " Vavir en Christo". Ciao.

Fall is in the Air

Yeah, I know. I was just talking about Indian Summer last week, and we are still seeing daytime highs in the 90's, but the days are growing shorter (there is no sun left on the pool after 5 PM) and the leaves are starting to fall from the grove of trees across the street in the park and blow into my yard. It is great golf weather with cool mornings and great conditions on the course.

I had a busy week of work with sports marketing on both Monday and Tuesday. I also took Thursday off and played in the NCGA qualifier. Monday we were out at the Troon course in Brooks, Yocha De He, which is the centerpiece of an Indian casino in Capay Valley. Pete and I hosted one of our retailers from Woodland and we had a late lunch followed by golf in the 100 degree weather. Troon courses are well known for the perfectly manicured fairways and wonderful greens. The rate is usually over $100, but they had just punched the greens last week and we were able to get on for $69 a man. We were on the 14th hole waiting on the group in front of us and we all had wet towels over our heads and were drinking ice water. I laughed and said, "are we out of our minds?". Pete laughed and said, "Nope. We're living the dream, brother!" I shot 83 on the day and was happy to tame that very difficult course.

Tuesday I was up and off to Redding for a Golf day outing with one of our agent's in the area. It was the Shasta County Insurance Golf day. Our group shot 6 under par, but didn't get in the money. We could have used Matt, but he was in Dallas on a Management trainee outing. It was a long day as the drive is close to three hours.

Thursday I did play in the qualifier. It is always fun to play in these as they have the officials with each group and they announce you on the first tee. I played like a spastic on the front side of the course with three double-bogeys and laid up a 46. I pulled it together on the back side, but it was too little, too late, as I shot 39 for an 85, net 72 and the 15 qualifiers from our site were at 70 or better. it was upsetting, but it was also good to shake off my malaise and play well on the back.

I played with Paul in our two man scramble Invitational event on Saturday and Paul and I could have run away with the tournament, but we bogeyed the number one and two handicap holes and ended up with a 32+33=65 for a net of 54. We tied for first low gross and took second low net. Our back 9 of 33 was one more than the other team that shot 65, so we had to settle for second place and $69 a man. I was supposed to play with Darren, but he had an event in Nashville over the weekend. The way that Darren has been playing lately, we would have cleaned up.

Darla and I went to church today and had the honor of hearing General Jerry Boykins speak on his testimony. It was incredible hearing his stories of praying with his men before they went out on missions and how his commander originally requested him to gather the guys and pray for their safety. From then on, his guys refused to leave on a mission until Boykins would say a prayer of protection over the guys. He has led an incredible life as a leader of the Delta forces and is now saving lives as he travels around the country and tells his story and packs houses of worship wherever her goes. We had about a dozen people give their lives to Christ in our service today.

Darla continues to grow her business and I am trying hard to have patience as the bills come in and she plans events in the coming months. This is the place in my life when I have to trust God to provide. I do very well and can make the bills on my own, but I'm used to paying extra on the mortgage and other bills. Darla and her family believe strongly in God's will and his provision and I am learning the ropes as a young Christian.

This has been a different day of sports with Dallas losing and the golf tournament being delayed until tomorrow. Even right now, the night game between Seattle and SF has been delayed for lightning. Thank God they don't stop games for rain or they'd never play a game in Seattle.

Darla is out swimming laps in the pool. It is one of her new exercise routines. She has been going to the gym every day and doing Spin classes, Pilates, and strength training classes. Darla's energy is 100% back and is good to have her. Sometimes we butt heads, but she is pretty strong willed and I prefer the feisty Darla to the vanilla brand that was here for about four months.

Jennifer was supposed to come today and go to church with us, but McKenny had a noon flight to New Jersey and she had to drop him off. Jennifer will transition back to Las Vegas next weekend. McKenny will drive back with her and help her move into her new apartment next weekend. Jennifer's company and Ericsson Electric have agreed to allow Jennifer to work from Vegas and make periodic trips to California to do some site walks. Most of her work is managing her construction sites, ordering materials and making sure that they have enough staff to complete the job. She does not need to be physically on site for her jobs. I know Samantha will be THRILLED to have her Mommy back full time and we look forward to seeing them in a couple of weeks with dad and Shirley.

I am getting ready to host our CEO again at our office in early October, in fact it will be the Thursday that we get back from Vegas. He is flying in mid morning and has to fly back to Los Angeles that afternoon. I am trying to prepare the staff for his visit by going over the budget, the history of the company and the various divisions that we have as a company. We are looking to expand our space and will meet with our landlord and our realtor to try to hammer out some kind of agreement.

Well, that will do it for this installment. I will be back at the keyboard next Sunday. I hope you all have a good week. Be well. Ciao.

Indian Summer

After the oddity of our rain soaked Labor Day last weekend, the temperatures have once again returned to just over 100 degrees. It is the afternoon of the first Sunday of NFL games and I am back in from about 90 minutes out on the pool. The pool temperatures are at 82 degrees and it is tremendously comfortable in the pool right now.

Our party on Labor Day turned into dice and cards for the guys and jewelry and a gabfest for the ladies. The guys played 3-13 and Greedy and enjoyed some fellowship and the ladies visited for awhile before one of them asked Darla about her jewelry and it turned into a Silpada party. It did continue to rain off and on all afternoon and I ended up making shish ke bobs in a drizzling rain. It was a fun afternoon and a nice end to the unofficial end of Summer. You could have fooled me as it was roasting today.

Darla had a good friend pass away this Summer and she found out about it on Facebook. That is a horrible way to find out. She had another friend who she found out died by having a Christmas card returned stamped "Deceased". She had a feeling that he had passed away. He was 64, but in ill health with complications from Parkinson's disease. Jim was there for Darla when she went through her divorce and had stayed close to her through the years and they kept up via phone calls. It turns out that he had contracted an infection, went into the hospital, and died. He was divorced and lived alone and his former law secretary tried to inform all of his friends and invite them t the ceremony, but could not find her number or address in his effects. Darla had been trying to contact him and reached out to a mutual friend and she gave her the bad news that Darla got last night.

It will be a busy golf week for me this week. I will play Yocha De He, the Troon course in Brooks on Monday, I'll be in Redding Tuesday for a Golf day for the Shasta County insurance agents and brokers, and I'll be off Thursday to play in an NCGA qualifier. I qualified to play in that earlier this Summer. 12 winners from this regional event will go on to Monterey in October and play at Spyglass Hill. At least I can't complain that I'm rusty when I play on Thursday. I'll be ready.

I did play Saturday during Power Hour, the $35 with cart first hour of tee times at Woodcreek. They gave us several $35 coupons when we checked in and let us know that the greens had been punched on the previous Monday and Tuesday. I struggled early in the round, but got my footing late and shot a nice 41+38=79. Anytime I can break 80, I'm happy. I was especially happy to shoot 79 on sanded and aerated greens.

Darla went with David to his Mud Run on Saturday in Marysville. His company, Hallsten, signed up a team to have some Team Building and David joined in. They dressed up as superheroes and slipped and slid thru the mud and foam and had a great time. Darla stayed out of the way and stayed relatively clean, but enjoyed the fun from a safe distance.

Darla and I joined Neil and Lilly at Thunder Valley casino's outside amphitheater on Thursday night for the Sammy Haggar concert. By the way, I had mentioned that Darryl had an album "The smoker you get, the player you drink" in the last blog update and identified it as Sammy Haggar, but realized later that it was Joe Walsh and his band  The Barnstormers who produced that album. Haggar was with Montrose, Chickenfoot, Van Halen and the Wabos. He had reps from each of those bands with Mike Anthony of Van Halen as the most recognizable. The band Rival Sons opened the show and played about 45 minutes. Sammy came on at 8 o'clock and played for two solid hours. He had band members from his old bands coming and going onstage, including two drummers, but he never left the stage. It was quite a retrospective of his 40 years in show business. Sammy made a comment early on that was a bit off color, but spoke volumes about his show. He asked who had never been to a Sammy Haggar concert. He then said, "Well, folks you may show up as a virgin, but you'll leave a whore!" At one point, Guy Fieri came out on stage (they are big buddies) and handed him a big gun that he shot streamers into the air over the crowd. Our seats were right up front (front row) and it was a great way to see the show.

Work is going great. I took the staff to lunch on Tuesday and we had a new employee start who will be management trainee. I had the air conditioning unit in the server room go out and the temperature in there was over 80 degrees. I alerted the management of the office complex on Wednesday and they waited until Friday to let me know that they were not responsible for private ac units that are not part of the building HVAC systems. So what, it still needs to be fixed. It got left over the weekend and we had temperatures of over 100 degrees this weekend. The unit will be fine as long as the office environment stays under 100 degrees and it did. I will only be there for about an hour tomorrow morning before I leave, so will have to leave that to Shawna to follow up on. I will also be gone Tuesday in Redding, so it better get fixed soon.

Well, that is short and sweet. Darla went to church this morning with both David and Daniel. We had gone last night and it is the same sermon and service today, but it was a chance for her to spend time with her boys, so she took it. We have a guest Pastor, General Jerry Boykin, who led the Delta force during the Blackhawk down incident. He was also the Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence operations under President George W Bush, he was involved in the hunt for Pablo Escobar in Columbia and also involved in the rescue operation in Iran in 1980. He will be speaking at a Men's Breakfast at William Jessup university next Saturday and we bought tickets for the boys to attend. Daniel will be here all week for a family wedding. I have golf on Saturday in our annual Invitational. I hope you all have a great week and continue to appreciate all that the Lord has provided for us. Ciao.

Labor Day 2013

We have a pool party today with 4 couples coming over at 2 PM for a barbecue. Nice. Well, nice until we awoke at 4:20 this morning to a driving thunderstorm that brought half an inch of rain in less than an hour. It is currently overcast and drizzly with intermittent rain showers. It is supposed to move off and bring partly cloudy skies and a high of 88 degrees today, but we will see. If the weather stays iffy, we will move the party indoors and just play cards and visit. The shish kebobs are skewered and await my attention at the grill this afternoon. It is unfortunate as this is the first time this Summer that Darla has felt like hosting a party.

Darla has really blossomed since quitting her social work gig. Her Silpada business is really taking off. She has booked 18 parties since going full time with Silpada (she'll have 8 parties in September alone) and signed on three new reps to her team of 44. She has to start chipping in for the bills on September 15th and is well on her way. She says that God has blessed her business and confirmed that it was the right decision to quit Alta. I'm very happy for her, but still concerned for the future. We moved to my health plan on September 1st and I will miss the convenience of Kaiser. Both of us have to get hooked up with new doctors as we both have prescriptions that will need to be filled with the new plan. The costs for co pays and medicines is higher with my plan and I just hope we don't have any bumps in the road as we transition to the new medical plan.

Work continues to amaze me. We had a goal of $1,800,000 in premium in August and $295,000 in income. We hit that mark by the 20th and I challenged the staff to take us to the next level and told them that I would host lunch at Romano's Macaroni Grill if we could hit $2,000,000 in premium and $320,000 in income. Pete argued with me and I told him that we have to continue to push the envelope. We closed the month at $2,235,000 in premium and $241,000 in income and I will take the staff to lunch tomorrow. We are really hitting on all cylinders as we were up 35% over 2012. It is a lot of fun and my CEO will visit the office next month as part of a west coast swing. I'm sure the visit will not be all roses and cotton candy. The boss always looks at things from a corporate standpoint (we should write with more of the national retailers and write more professional lines and vacant buildings), but it will be hard to dampen the enthusiasm and momentum that we have in the Roseville office right now. it's a joy working with my staff. I have a new employee starting on Tuesday and we have finally run out of space. This will be my 27th employee and we are now negotiating with the landlord to blow out the wall behind my office and pick up another 1200 square feet of office space. One of my underwriters is transferring to our wholly owned insurance company, Atain, in November and the new employee, Katie, will be taking her place. Connie will stay domiciled in my office, but work for the insurance company as an underwriter. I also have one employee from Harvey's office in San Francisco located in my office, so have a total of 28 bodies in my office now.

I played in the Labor Day tournament yesterday and the clouds and humidity from this current storm rolled into the area. It was hot and muggy yesterday and the scores were pretty high. I struggled most of the day, but managed to hang on for a 41+42=83 and tie for third net in my flight. I also sunk a 40 foot putt for birdie on the number four handicap hole that won me $44 in skin money on the day, so it was overall a good day. Darla went to join Alicia and Don at Folsom Lake and David joined them for boating. Jennifer and McKenny were invited but had a prior commitment. I finished up my round, visited with the guys for awhile and then headed home to swim, shower and drive on to Don and Alicia's in Folsom. Don is a Kansas City guy and loves barbecue. He is now on a smoker kick where he smokes the meat with different woods (apple wood, almond, etc.). It imparts a smoky taste to the meat and it is an acquired taste. I'm not a big fan of it because it tastes like the meat fell off the grill and into the coals. He cooked a great chicken gumbo and I filled up on that and had a small amount of the meat and drowned it in barbecue sauce to cut the smoky flavor. I'm guessing that the smoker idea came from a lifelong cigarette smoker that just enjoys the taste of ash with his food. Darla tells me that I need to acquire the taste for smoked meats and I tell her she needs to acquire the taste for good wine. We have agreed to disagree.

Neil and Lilli and Darla and I are off to see Sammy Hagar on Thursday night at the Thunder Valley casino. Neil is a big Sammy fan and we look forward to it. I remember Darryl had a record album of Sammy Hagar's in the 70's: "The Smoker you Drink, The Player You Get". It should be fun. I called the first day that the tickets were available and got Section 1, Row A, Seat 8,9,10 and 11. Front row, baby!

Darla is working on cleaning the kitchen and vacuuming and wants to know when I will help. It is 11:20 AM and the gang will get here at 2 PM. I told her to keep her pants on.

I took the 300 in to Jiffy Lube the other day for an oil change and when I went to leave after work, had a low tire. My tires are brand new and I stopped at the gas station and filled it up and haven't had a problem since. The only thing I can think is that they fill the tires as part of their service and the valve stem got stuck and bled the air out of the tire. It was a little concerning. I have a low tire sensor as part of the computer in the 300 and it was winking at me when I got into the car.

I have my final fantasy football draft tomorrow night. It is for the company league and we will meet at the Sports Page bar at 5 PM tomorrow night to draft our team. This is my third and final team and a good opportunity for team building as most of the players are underwriters. I will buy appetizers for everyone and they can buy their own alcohol. It will be an expensive day tomorrow with lunch for 23 and then the draft party, but it is a good opportunity to bond together as a unit.

Well, Darla continues to give me dirty looks and I need to roll up my sleeves (hard to do when you're wearing a tank top) and help out as soon as possible to keep harmony in the homestead. Have a great week and I will be back at the keyboard right before the Dallas Cowboy's Sunday night opener next week. Are you ready for some football? Ciao.