The HEAT is On

Well, I guess it's not as bad as Vegas, but 109 degrees tomorrow will match their high temperature. We will then cool off toward the middle of the week, if you call 99 degrees "cool". It was 98 degrees yesterday and topped out at 102 today. Strangely, our high was at 4 PM today and then it cooled to 97 and is expected to jump back up to 99 before sunset. This really does seem like Las Vegas.

 

I have been in touch with both Darryl and Randy today and they both have plans to be in the Bay Area for Daniel's wedding on August 31. I managed to lock in a three bedroom condo in Aptos for August 27-30th and we will celebrate Jennifer's birthday at the beach. If either Darryl or Randy come in for the wedding early, we can manage to make room for them in the condo. Saturday we will move over to a room at the Country Inn and Suites in Sunnyvale. The rehearsal and dinner will be that night and the wedding will be Sunday evening. We, along with Steve (Daniel's dad), will be hosting the dinner. Unfortunately (sic,) Becky's Mom is a devout non drinker, so we will not have liquor at the wedding or the rehearsal dinner, so I won't be able to spend extravagant amounts on liquor. Hey, the bar at the Country Inn is open.

 

Saturday was the NCGA qualifier for the Senior 4 Ball championship and there were 30 teams vying for two spots in the next round representing our club. Steve and I teamed up again. We made it a couple of years ago to the regular 4 ball qualifier and were quickly eliminated at the first tournament. This year we decided to try for the Senior event. I started out the day horribly with a triple bogey-double bogey start. I went two over for the rest of the front nine and shot 43. Steve shot 41 and we managed a 31 on the front as a team. I managed to finish with a birdie on number 9 and that took us from three under to five under. I stayed hot and birdied the par 5 10th for another net eagle and we went on to shoot a 29 on the back for a team 60 and landed a spot in the qualifier representing RGC. There was one other 60 and two teams shot 61. Steve and I stumbled on the back nine and dragged in with a double bogey on 18 or we would have been at 59. I shot 43 on the back for an 86 and Steve had a 40 for 81, his best score in a while. I'm happy to make it on to the next round and it is now two years in a row that I have qualified for an NCGA event and represented the club. Last year was the Net Amateur. Our next event will be August 20th likely in Stockton. If we make it through there, we will play for the Northern California Senior event at Poppy Ridge in September.

 

Darla is frantically working to earn a last minute trip to the Dominican Republic with Silpada and has a huge one time only sale on through tomorrow. She was quite away off her mark as of Friday, but thanks to people like Shirley and Darla's Mom coming through with nice orders, she is almost there.

She is stressing, so if you need jewelry, call her and she'll give you a huge deal on her product. I, of course, get the benefit of a February all expenses paid trip to the Dominican Republic if she makes it.

 

Friday, I played poker with  he boys and got scalped for about $50. I won big in the last poker night so was due to get a haircut. We had the game at Carl's place. Carl is the Dad of the other QB that played on David's team in high school. He is going through a divorce and is a little bit scatterbrained right now. He chose not to turn on the air conditioning and it was roasting in his house. We finally got him to open the windows after the sun went down, but it was brutally hot in his house. The guys were totally on him about turning the a/c on, but he said he hasn't turned it on in over a year and wasn't starting that night. I'm surprised his wife left him.

 

The lease at work is finally signed, the permits are being pulled and the demolition on the space should start in a week to ten days. I expect to be in the additional space by about mid August. I was able to get them to reduce the number of reserved parking spaces that we have from 7 to 3. I use mine every day and one other guy uses his ( He has a new diesel Jetta). The problem is that the spaces are a long walk from our office and people are, by nature, lazy. I, of course, have the closest reserved covered spot to our office and the other spots are another 300 yards away. I wanted to cut it to 3 total spaces, but we have 4 now.

 

I have completed a couple of promotions in the office and my assistant is now our Operations Manager in the office. I have another position that I'm hiring for right now and that will be a new position for the office and that of a pool assistant for the Commercial Underwriters. Right now, each assistant is assigned to an individual team and when I hire another assistant it ends up only benefiting one team. My goal is to have three pool assistants that will handle the routine endorsements for every team and also act as a training ground for new team assistants that I can promote on to a team. The idea is to free up the team assistants to concentrate more on renewals and new business and continue to produce premium growth by having one hire benefit four Underwriting teams. It will also allow me to increase the premium writings per employee number. Right now I have 26 people and will write about $26,000,000 in premium. My goal is to have 30 employees and write $35,000,000 in premium. If I can get to that number, my ROI will go up and so will the profit in our office. The fixed costs are already in place, my only additional cost is salary and benefits at this point.

 

July 4th hits this week as it does every year and we will be at Charlie and Frieda's on Friday for a barbecue. We may have some folks over on Sunday. Saturday is our Firecracker tournament at the club. I was supposed to get together with Rick, my friend from the golf club that is fighting liver and pancreatic cancer. He called and told me that he had his last chemo treatment on Friday and labs on Thursday, so asked to push it off to this week. I'll try again to get together with him this week. It is incredibly sad, but Rick is both a fighter and a Christian, so he has two great things going for him that will help him no matter how this all turns out.

 

Well, that is about it for this week. I hope you are all doing well. I am excited to see my two brothers (and their wives) at the wedding. Randy received his save the date card, but Darryl didn't. We filled him in on dates, etc. Somehow there was a breakdown in the system with Daniel and Becky and Save the Date cards. Their visit is just something more to look forward to this Summer. Life is good. Ciao.



Summer 2014 is Here!!

Just back from our annual golf trip to Reno, Nevada. We drove up Friday and I played three golf courses in three days. Neil and I drove up together on Friday, leaving my house at 7:00AM for the 2 hour drive up to Reno. We played Sierra Sage, a private 18 hole facility in Northern Reno and met Steve up at the course along with Brad, Paul and Wes. The course is nice, but run on a shoestring budget by a man and his wife that wanted to get into the golf business. He bought this course from the county and it is a going concern, in pretty good shape, but the sand traps are not full of fresh sand and some of the sagebrush is a bit overgrown in the rough areas. It was the start of what turned out to be a pretty windy weekend in Reno. Reno is technically high desert, unlike Vegas, which is low desert. Both areas tend to be fairly flat and the wind can be pretty fierce. We teed off at 10:00 AM and the wind wasn't bad, but got stronger as the day progressed. I shot 86 on what was just a warm up round between friends. Unfortunately, it also turned out to be the best round of the weekend for me.

 

Darla and Lilly drove up in the afternoon and we met them at Scheels, a huge sporting goods store in the vein of Bass Pro Shops and Cabellas, about 3:00 PM. They have a huge float plane hanging from the ceiling upstairs and a full Ferris Wheel in the center of the store. Quite impressive and something that Neil had been telling me about for about a year. The problem was I had my clubs in his car and he was holding us hostage in the store. I was tired and hungry and wind blown and just wanted to get a hamburger and get back to the hotel for a shower. Neil and I had talked on the way over to the store about Steve's desire to eat dinner that night at Brew Brothers, a sports bar in the Silver Legacy. Charlie and Frieda were staying at the Silver Legacy (as we were) and we wanted to have dinner at La Strada, an Italian restaurant in the El Dorado casino. I told him that Charlie and Frieda and us had discussed it ahead of time and had plans for dinner at La Strada. I thought I made it clear that he and Lilly were invited, but he misunderstood and when I asked him if he was having dinner with us, he said that he was eating with Steve and Brenda. I even mentioned at the time to Darla that Neil was wimping out because Steve has a pretty authoritative personality. We finally got the okay to get our things from his car after patronizing him and going upstairs to see the float plane and the collection of life sized US Presidents on display. I stopped at the In and Out Burger on the way to the hotel and had a small burger and a chocolate shake. We got checked into the hotel and went to dinner with Charlie and Frieda at 7:30 and had a great meal. We all chose the Chef's dinner, where the chef gives us a five course meal consisting of appetizers, a pasta dish (gnocchi and mushroom  ravioli), salad, the main course (ahi tuna and a small beef tenderloin), finished off with a tiramisu. Excellent and all for $40 per person. Darla and I had an Italian margarita, which is a regular margarita with a splash of Amaretto, which smooths it out. It turns out that Charlie and Frieda are also nickel video poker players and we spent an enjoyable evening gaming and drinking. During the last two courses of the dinner, we were bombarded by Steve and Brenda and Paul and Brad. Brad entered the room in the back announcing, "Paging the Snoop Lion Party!!" We had a few laughs with them and sent them packing when our main courses arrived. The other diners around us in the fancy restaurant weren't overly thrilled with us. Neil and Lilly were out in the front of the restaurant, but refused to walk back with everyone thinking it was bad manners.

 

Saturday we had an 11:00 AM tee time at Somersett, a private country club in West Reno. We met Charlie and Frieda for breakfast at 9 AM and talked and visited for most of an hour and then were off to the course. The course is gorgeous, but very difficult and the wind blew in about the time we teed off and was blowing with gusts up to 40 MPH. It was difficult to the point that I hit an 8 iron into a blowing head wind on a par 3 127 yard hole and the ball went up, hit a wall and landed on the front of the green 36 feet from the cup ( I normally hit an 8 iron 150 yards). I was the only one of my group on the green the rest were at least 20 yards short of the green. Somersett is the first picture of the golf courses above Wolf Run is the second). I struggled around the course shooting a 47+46=93, which included a birdie 4 on the final hole.

 

Saturday night we set up dinner reservations at Bertha Miranda's, a family owned Mexican Restaurant on Mill Street about four blocks off Virginia Street. This is the second year that we had a group out to this restaurant and the food is excellent, but they serve pitchers of margaritas that fill eight glasses for $18. Our group of 13 managed to go through 7 pitchers of margaritas in the 2 and a half hours that we were there. Brad called over one of the waiters and told him that this was a family reunion and that it was "Little Brother Charlie's" birthday. The wait staff all came out with a serving of fried ice cream in a fried tortilla and sang Happy Birthday to Charlie. He was grinning like a loon and ate up all the attention. His birthday is in July, but he didn't care. It was a big laugh and we had a great time at dinner. We spent another couple of hours afterward playing slots with Charlie and Frieda and were off to bed by midnight.

 

Today, we met for breakfast at 8 AM and played Wolf Run, the home course of the University of Nevada Wolf pack and owned and run by the University. It is a course that we have played many times and it is fun to come back and try to improve upon prior outings. I had a great start to the round birdieing two of the first five holes, before imploding and shooting 44 on the front followed by another 44 on the back for 88. Steve in our group shot 101, but birdied the final two holes to keep it that low. All of the guys in our group (including Tim and Neil) had birdies during the round which was great. The gals met us afterward at the bar and we talked and visited until finally heading back to Roseville at 4 PM. We were home by 6:15 and in the pool by 6:20. It was an exhausting weekend and my lips are chapped from the wind, but we had such a good time and it is good to get together with friends and share this life.

 

Daniel is trying to figure out where to go on his honeymoon. his Mom and I are paying for his flight and room, but he is between Hawaii, New England and Aspen, Colorado. As he hems and haws, I have given him a dollar limit as flights are going up as I write this and he needs to get this booked. I know that Becky's parents are putting out a boat load of money for the wedding, so we are getting off cheap. Also, as a struggling stockbroker at the time and just transitioning back into insurance, I so appreciated Dad and Mom setting us up for a trip through Vacationsss. I'm sure Dan and Becky will appreciate making memories themselves and not having to break their collective banks to do it.

 

Well, that is our weekend in a nutshell or blog entry as it were. I hope that you are all doing well. I know that I will hit the ground running tomorrow at work with a webinar at 8:30 AM in our conference room with a new carrier that Harvey has arranged for us. Time cards are also due in to me (electronically) by 9 AM. Be well. Ciao.

 

 

 



Father's day 2014

 

Finally have a minute to sit down and pull up the blog and add a few lines. It was a busy Sunday with church this morning. It was the annual car show at church and they had a classic Charger up on stage and we had Tom Klauer of Tom Klauer Motorsports and the CEO of Pick n Pull Auto parts as our guest speaker. Tom is a NASCAR driver in the NASCAR Pro Series K&N Pro Series races. There is a picture of me with Tom and his Pick n Pull Impala Stock Car above. I had thought that the car show would be 15 or 20 cars of church members, but there were over 100 cars on premises and there were awards and the NASCAR experience car as well as Tom's stock car and another 5 of his stock cars, including a Jimmy Johnson Lowe's car that he had bought from Hendrick Motorsports. I was really impressed. Some of the pictures are above. Neil and Lilly met us over at the church and went through the car show with us. from there we went out to lunch.

 

Darla and I relaxed on the pool and then left the house about 4:30 to head to Yuba City to meet Earl and Frances, Darla's parents where we bought them dinner at Cool Hand Luke's. We were back to the house by about 7:30 and I put the finishing touches on the backsplash of the pool.

 

I have been unhappy with the look of the flagstone around the perimeter of the pool. Stone tends to calcify over time and the rock was completely washed out with scale and calcium deposits. I had tried cleaning it with Muriatic Acid, but it is hard to work with and frankly a little dangerous. I did some research and found a product called ETCH that mixes with water and can be applied with a steel brush. It completely etches the exterior of the rock and cleans off the calcium and scale deposits. I did the work on Saturday and sprayed Thompson's Water Seal on the backsplash. I didn't have enough to do the coping around the pool, so stopped today and picked up another three cans of the Water Seal. I applied that when I got home tonight. The reds and browns of the flagstone is back in evidence and the Thompson's gives it a wet look that I really like. I'm thrilled with the results and will make sure to do the etching treatment every Spring.

 

The other pictures above are of our Continuing Education event on Wednesday at my office. We had a total of 68 agents show up for two classes. The pictures are of our wine and beer event after the classes and pictures from the dinner we had afterward at Fat's Restaurant in Roseville. The pictures are of Peter with three of our Assistant Underwriters, Alison, Cindy and Jennifer and of Shawna at dinner with Leah and Katie, the two management trainees that helped set up and do all of the signups for the event. They did a great job and learned a lot through the process. The event was not only well attended, but was very popular with our agents. We will likely try to do this once or twice a year going forward. We have several companies that do emergency repairs on claims that are lining up to help pay for our next event. They want to get in front of the retail agents and are willing to sponsor the food and booze for these events.

 

The build out is a slow and frustrating process and the slow down now is due to the permit process. I have a call in to our real estate department to get a time line of when I can expect the actual construction to commence and when it will be completed. I will do more hiring once I get the additional space in place. I had a pool assistant lined up who backed out at the last minute and I have that position to fill now. I have a young man lined up now that I may offer the position to, but he works for an accounting firm now and I heard through the grapevine that they have offered him a partnership. I have lunch on Tuesday with a friend of Leah who just graduated from UC Davis about that job. I'm just hedging my bet here.

 

I'm also in the process of doing four promotions in the office and have sent the paperwork through on all of those. Our office continues to grow and I have to continue to add to my management team to handle the continued growth and future growth.

 

I visited with Jennifer today and she posted a picture of me in Halloween costume from when she was a youngster. I am dressed like a nerd and look just like Randy did as a young adult. Jennifer continues to get better and is anxious to have the stent removed from her kidney. She went into the doctor last week to have her kidney function tested. The results will be back this week and if all goes well, she will go back into the hospital to have the stent removed. If there are any complications, she may have to have the kidney removed. We are praying that all is well there.

 

I found out this week that one of my good friends, Rick, has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. he has been sick for about four months and has lost 35 pounds. The genius' at Kaiser initially treated him for acid reflux and then diagnosed him with diabetes and complications from diabetes. Rick got deathly ill two weeks ago and went into the hospital where they finally did a cat scan and found not only the pancreatic cancer, but also that the cancer has spread to his liver as well. It is inoperable and he will start chemo this week. It is incredibly sad. Rick has traveled with us to Mexico, been front and center at all our swimming parties and golf trips. Darryl met Rick and Jan on his trip to Monterey a few years ago. Darla and I are both really torn up by this. Please pray for Rick and his family.

 

I took Thursday off this last week and took a road trip with Neil, Boyd and Andy to Rio Vista on the Delta and The Trilogy Golf Course at the gated community in Rio Vista. It was windy, but I managed a 39 on the front and a 44 on the back for 83. Boyd shot 80, Andy 89 and Neil not so good. his comment to me on the 18th hole after putting two more balls in the water, "I'll never be back to this f****** course!". Nice.

 

We are off to a three day golf trip in Reno next weekend and will be staying at the Silver Legacy casino in downtown Reno. Neil and I leave early Friday and will play Sierra Sage Golf Course in Reno. Saturday is Somersett Country Club and Sunday is Wolf Run, the University of Nevada Reno home course. I look forward to getting away.

 

I hope all is well with each of you. happy father's Day to dad and all of the fathers out there. Be well. Ciao.  

Busy Week

 

It was a ridiculously busy week for me with a golf tournament on Monday, a sick day on Tuesday (intestinal issues), one day in the office Wednesday with meetings and catch up after vacation, a trip Thursday with Matt in my office 343 miles up to Eureka where we played in another golf tournament, followed by a day of travel and marketing calls Friday as we made our way back to the Roseville area. I played golf Saturday in a tournament, dinner out and a trip to the Sacramento FC Republic soccer game that night with one of my agents and his wife and then we had Neil and Lilly over today for swimming and out to dinner tonight for the final celebration of Darla's 50th birthday.

 

I'm tired just writing this. Monday was our Sacramento Insurance Agents and Brokers Golf Day and I was out at the course by 9 AM to help set up the signs and help prepare for the tournament. One of Pete's agents couldn't make it to the event as his son was playing in the college World Series of baseball. Pete called me Sunday night and asked for Neil's phone number. Neil isn't an insurance agent, but he is a golfer. Neil ended up joining us on Monday and playing with Pete's group. Unfortunately, my week before where we were on vacation I think caught up with me. I must have caught a bug on the plane, but I started percolating during the day and had a sour stomach all day. I made it through the day, but didn't eat or drink anything other than water and Sierra Mist during the day. I made it through the evening and helped clean up before driving home. I got home about 8:30 and told Darla I wasn't feeling well. I laid down on the bed and woke up at 11:30 and got up, took a shower and went to bed. I had a slight fever.

 

I woke up the next morning after sleeping fitfully throughout the night with a raging fever and called into work. I had expense accounts to work on, so got on the computer and worked for about two hours. I laid down after that and slept for another two hours. My fever broke in the early afternoon and although my stomach was still pretty iffy for the next two days, I was basically back to 100%. Peter stopped by about 4:30 and tried to drop off a fire pit that he won at the golf tournament the day before. He had one already and, being Pete, he decided I should have it. I was off getting a haircut and he didn't feel good about leaving the box on the front doorstep. He was out on Wednesday doing some marketing calls and I was off to Eureka, so he coordinated with Darla to drop it off on Thursday.

 

I picked Matt up at 5:30 on Thursday and we were off to Eureka, up Highway 5 to Hwy 20 and over to 101 for the trip up the coast. We made one stop for snacks and drinks and another at a rest stop and were up to Arcata and the country club by 11:00AM. We met our agents for lunch, hit balls and were on the golf course at 1 PM.  this tournament last year with a 12 under par and this year we couldn't get in gear as a team and shot a 65 for 4th place. We were frustrated when we finished the tournament and wanted to get in a few more holes. We ended up playing nine and I starts with a chip in eagle on the par five first hole and ended up with a 37. None of us were in the mood to sit and have rubber chicken so we blew off the dinner and drove into Arcata and had dinner at an old school Italian restaurant and sat and visited and had petite filet and gnocci for dinner with some good wine and a few cocktails.

 

The trip home Friday was long and punctuated with a couple of agency visits, one in Eureka and another in Ukiah, about two and a half hours south of Eureka on Highway 101. We got home about 4:00 PM and it was 100 degrees, so I jumped in the pool and relaxed until about 5:30. I then put the sealer on the stamped concrete that would take 24 hours to seal.

 

Saturday was the golf tournament and Darla was off to Folsom for Lucas' 4th birthday party which was at a park and thank God it had a water feature for the kids to run through. I played like a guy tired and worn out and shot 43+44=87. It was 102 degrees by the time I got off the course and I rushed home and took the plunge in the pool. Darla joined me and we relaxed until about 4:30 when we were off to dinner with Ron, one of my largest agencies' principal and a friend from the golf club. I took he and his wife out to dinner and he had tickets for the minor league soccer game. The Sacramento Republic FC is a new team and they are averaging over 20,000 fans per game and out drawing seven MLS teams around the country. The hope is to lure MLS soccer to town within two years. For whatever reason this is a soccer rich area and the electricity in the stadium is incredible. I really enjoyed myself and the final score in the game against Arizona was 1-1.

 

Today was 108 degrees and we called Neil and Lilly after breakfast this morning to invite them over for a swim and then dinner afterward. Neil insisted on buying the dinner as they had invited us over and again for Darla's 50th birthday and we weren't able to get together. Neil brought me a bottle of Canadian Mist as a thank you for the invite to the golf tournament. He told me that I have to buy my own Ginger Ale.

 

I have another busy week this week with some folks coming in to town from Arizona to host a continuing education course for our agents. We have 80 agents coming on Wednesday for a morning session, lunch, an afternoon session and a wine and beer tasting sponsored by a restoration company in our offices afterward. My assistant, Shawna, helped to set up the continuing education event, lunch and the wine and beer tasting. She is on the right in the picture of our Putting contest tent at the golf day on Monday. Shawna really worked hard to get us sponsors for the event and our only cost is the rental chairs and tables that will be delivered on Tuesday. I'll have dinner on Wednesday night with the underwriters and the marketing people coming in for the event.    

 

Well, it is after ten o'clock on Sunday night. I'm tired and ready to call it a night. I will be back at the keyboard next weekend. I hope you are all well. Ciao.

Back from Mexico and all is right in the world

 

 

We are back and although a time share is a truly poor investment from a financial perspective, we absolutely love the resort at the Grand Luxxe and look forward to our trips every year. The pace at which they are adding buildings and amenities is truly impressive. We have owed at the Grand Mayan resort for ten years now and have made six trips to the resort and each one just seems to be better. It is truly a home away from home for us. The staff are tremendously well trained and especially the concierge and the activities staff go out of their way to make your vacation a truly memorable one. Darla and I had a relaxing and invigorating week. The weather was hot and humid and it did rain one day (Thursday) all day and we just relaxed in our condo and read and slept the day away. Friday and Saturday were the best days with bright blue skies and temperatures in the mid 90's. It felt a good ten degrees warmer because of the high humidity, but we spent Friday by the pool from morning until after happy hour at 5 PM.

 

We also took an excursion this trip with Vallarta Adventures. It was a catamaran (see above) with 75 people on board. We met at the Dolphin Experience just down the road from our resort at 7:30 on Wednesday for breakfast and were on the boat by 8 PM heading to the port in Puerto Vallarta to pick up the rest of our passengers. From there, we sailed out to Los Arcos and a small inlet where we snorkeled and kayaked for about an hour. They served lunch after that, a surprisingly good deli spread with several salads, ham, turkey, roast beef and cheeses. From there they opened the bar which was included in the cost of the excursion and Darla and I enjoyed rum punch, margaritas, rum and coke, tequila sunrise, etc. We arrived about 40 minutes later at Yalapa, a small fishing village that is only accessible by boat. Half of the passengers went on a fifty minute hike up to a small waterfall (that was only a trickle as the rainy season starts in about a month), while the rest of us took up residence on  the beach and were pestered by the locals selling cheap jewelry and trying to get us to take a picture with an iguana. We relaxed and drank and Darla went into the ocean. I slept on the chaise lounger provided. The hikers joined us later with tales of the tiny drip of water that was the waterfall and the land mines of horse manure all over the trails from the horseback riders.

 

We were back by 4 PM in time for a quick swim and then happy hour at 5 PM. We aren't big drinkers and went through about three 2 liter bottles of soda in our room. My bill for the whole week, including the meal plan, our voice card that Darla used to keep up with home, Darla's two massages, our drinking and tips was just $600. We had a great time and are already looking forward to our next trip when the new pool over by the spa tower will be open and tower 4 will be complete. We hope to bring Sam someday and will reach out to John to see if we can talk him into it. It truly is safe in our gated resort.

 

The picture of the young girl and the musicians behind is from the airport where a group of young locals set up and played for the passengers as we waited for our flights. They were all quite talented and we enjoyed their show. The second picture is of our night at Gong restaurant. We have avoided the restaurant since we showed up and they refused to take our meal plan tickets back when Darryl and Cheryl came with us. Darla didn't want to go (who eats Asian food in Mexico?), but we had a great time there. The appetizer of shrimp tempura was the best appetizer we had all week and the sukiyaki for two was paid for by one meal plan ticket and included cabbage, rice noodles, mushrooms, onions, bamboo, carrots, celery, tofu and thin strips of rib eye steak. We cooked it at our table and enjoyed it so much we came back twice for the same dinner. The only change was we had tempura ice cream the first night and fried bananas and ice cream the second. The Gong restaurant is now on our rotation. We also ate for the first time at the Mexican food restaurant, Epazote, in Grand Luxxe  Tower One. It was good, but definitely last on our list what with Punta Arena Seafood restaurant, Tramonto Italian and now the Gong restaurant. We ate well and the dinners alone added up to $414 for just the appetizers, main course and desserts for the six meals. The breakfasts are kind of optional (buffets), but go for $16.99 apiece, so we certainly made out on the meal plan. Darla and I both have the omelets, the closest thing to ordering off the menu.

 

We arrived home last night at 6:30 and Neil picked us up with our Explorer. We stopped at the Pro Shop Saturday and picked him up a golf shirt with the Vidanta logo on it for helping us. Darla and I were exhausted and ordered a pizza for dinner. We slept in this morning and missed church (heathens!), neither of us ready to say goodbye to our vacation just yet. I decided to re stain the stamped concrete today as Darla was busy with her Silpada gig. I mowed the lawn and cleaned the pool, also cleaning the tile with acid, but waiting until the water is a tad warmer to get in and use the pumice stone on the tougher calcium deposits. The staining took me about three hours broken up by breaks to watch the Memorial golf tournament on dvr. The playoff between Na and Matsuyama looked more like an LPGA event (The Asian players dominate there).  The work felt good and was a good end to my vacation. I will put down the sealer on it next Saturday. It looks like a good warm week this week (it was 95 degrees today) and the pool is close to 80 degrees now. It should be just right next week. BTW, we avoided the Grand Luxxe pool this trip as it was too hot, probably 90 degrees. The Punta pool was much better and has a swim up bar as well.

 

Well, that is it. I want to go out and do some hand watering on the lawn. I am off to our Sacramento IBA golf event tomorrow at Serrano. Pete called me today and one of his guys had to drop out. He called me to get Neil's number and Neil is playing in Pete's foursome tomorrow. I'll be in the office for two days and then Matt and I drive up to Eureka for another golf event, where we will defend our title that we won last year. I hope everyone is doing well. We will talk soon. Ciao.