A Good Weekend is in the books

Poker, golf, dinner with friends, breakfast with my bride on Saturday. What could be better? Well, we do have a car in the shop. I drove Darla's car last weekend and noticed a high pitched whine coming from the engine. At first I thought it was laboring to change gears and was a transmission problem. We took her Explorer in on Thursday and had it diagnosed and the whine is coming from the transfer case. It is a $750 part and another $450 for labor That is for a used one or a rebuilt one. It could be a bit less if they are able to rebuild our part. The car only has 79,000 miles on it, but Ford has a crap warranty that covers for 5 years or 50,000 miles. We have a 2013 Ford Explorer that has a transfer case that is shot. Damn.

 

I did play poker on Friday night and had to have John come over and pick me up. Darla was meeting Frieda at 6:30 for dinner and poker was at 7. John was good enough to drive over and pick me up. I got a call from my boss, Harvey as I was waiting for John and he wanted to know what happened in my office on Friday. I asked him to be a little more specific and he asked me if Shawna resigned. What? I asked him why he asked that and he said that Shawna sent his Operations Manager a note saying that she had resigned. A little weird that it came from her office computer, but I told him I'd get to the bottom of it .John picked me up and I called Shawna on the way to poker. Basically, Harvey's employee who is the regional Operations Manager had sent Shawna a note that said, "Long time no talk, what's been up with you?" Shawna has picked up on my humor and sent her a note saying  "I resigned." Then the poop hit the fan. I told her to get on the phone and fix it.

We played at Ron's house. Ron is the marketing manager for our largest agency and a good friend from the golf club. We went to soccer together a couple of weeks ago and played in the 6-6-6 tournament at the club today. He and his wife just bought a house in the old section of Roseville. It is a small house with a huge lot and he has completely redone the back yard, putting in a large cement patio, new stairs, a gazebo and lighting, a new lawn and a fountain. We played cards out in the back yard and he cooked tri tip sandwiches for dinner. I had a low coin count and bought $20 worth of quarters before we started. Luckily they were all still in the wrapper when I finished the night. I won early and often and ended up about $35 at the end of the night, not counting the $20 worth of new coin that I have. I've got about $70 worth of quarters now and I'm set for the next few games.

I noticed my headlights starting to be a bit dim and really noticed some oxidation and discoloration on the lenses. I bought the 3M Headlight restoration kit for $15 from Amazon. It uses an attachment to your electric drill and 3 different sets of sanding discs. You basically sand down to a new layer of plastic and then polish the lens to bring it back to clear. It's a little scary when you are using the heavier sanding disc and the entire lens (which costs about $200 to replace) is completely clouded over. You slowly use a lighter sanding disc and then a lighter one to remove all of the tiny scratches and then a final buffing sponge to apply and polish rubbing compound onto the lens. here are the before and after pictures. I was very impressed with the outcome.

 

I also took the staff out on Thursday for lunch to celebrate our great month in August. We ended up over at a restaurant in Granite Bay that overlooks a quarry pond and it was a beautiful day and we enjoyed sitting out on the patio and having a great meal and some good team building time. I even kicked in for four mudslide chocolate cakes for dessert. We are having another good month this month and have a shot at another celebration lunch next month. Here are the pictures:

 

Darla and I took it easy on Saturday and I did some lawn work and cleaned the pool and did the chemicals. We went out to breakfast in the morning because we were out of eggs. We had a nice time visiting and enjoying a nice morning out together. I spent about an hour and a half reading on the pool and then came in and cleaned up and headed with Darla to Folsom for Luke's soccer game. He is at that level where they play four against four and have tiny little goals with no goalies. They split the teams into two and play two games simultaneously and switch players between the two games. It is a trip to watch, but hard to keep track of what is happening and the score. From what I could see, Luke's team won one of the games 8-0 and the other 6-2.

 

 

After soccer, we headed over to church and had about 20 minutes to relax and drink some lemonade before the service. It was a great service about tithing and a follow-up on last week's message. One fact that came out of the message (and I always get a nugget to add to the data base) is that the word "priorities" did not exist until 1940. Prior to that it was only "priority". It makes perfect sense as how can you have more than one priority? There should not be a plural for the word.

 

As Darla and I were leaving church, Vance and Terralee Ginther raced over to our car waving and having us stop. They wanted to go to dinner and ran over to invite us. There is a relatively new restaurant across the street from the Roseville Galleria and it is a build your own pizza joint called Blast. We had a great visit with them and quite a few laughs. They used to be in our Church Life Group with Bob and Vicky Pando. Vance is starting a men's group on Monday nights and I signed up as a casual attender. I want to watch the debates this Monday and I enjoy winding down with football on Monday nights.

 

Today I had the golf tournament with Ron. We had 14 strokes, but neither of us could chip the ball worth a darn and shot an 81, net 67. The winners shot a 71 and had 19 strokes for a 52. I usually don't play the "goofy golf" tournaments because it's not about skill, just luck of the draw with your partner and not having bad holes on the same hole. 52? Really?

 

I have Friday off this week and will take a road trip with John, and Neil and meet Bob Pando in Napa for my second shot at the Napa course at Kennedy Park. I did NOT play well the first time we hit the course last year and it kicked my butt. I shot 98 and plan to play much better this time around.

 

Well, that's it for this time. I was a little late tonight as I watched the Dallas Cowboys' rookies, Dak Prescott and Zeke Elliott lead them to a resounding victory on Sunday night Football. Next week, the Cowboys will be in town to play the 49ers at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara. I see Dallas putting up a convincing win, but the Niners tend to play tough at home They just don't have much talent on their team. Gabbert hasn't played great for them and Kaepernick is now a vegan and can't seem to put on any weight. He even grew out an afro, but is still under 200 pounds. Mix in a hamburger, dude. I'm done with the whole National Anthem protest. The NFL really missed the boat on this one. If I had one of my employees show up at work and put up either a Black Lives Matter poster or a Trump sign in their cubicle, they'd either take it down or be sent home. They have every right to their opinions, but no rights when it comes to causing strife in MY office. The NFL should have nipped this one in the bud, but stupid is as stupid does. I hope all is well with each of you. Ciao.

 

 

Fall arrives this week, and Autumn too..

 

Darla was treated to a Luke Bryan concert this week by her good friend, Missy. It was Missy's birthday and she asked her husband for tickets to the concert on Thursday night, but asked if she could get two tickets and take Darla. Darla lent Missy some cowboy boots and they headed out to see Little Big Town and Luke Bryan at the Toyota Amphitheater in Wheatland. I guess they had a great time, but had some Amazons show up in front of them and had trouble seeing.  Missy and Darla have been friends for 20 years.

 

I played golf on Thursday in a charity event. Our team shot a 65 and the winners were 58. I did win a closest to the pin (which you can't cheat on) and won a gift card for Home Depot. I used it Thursday afternoon and bought some seed, lawn soil, starter fertilizer and a mill bastard file to sharpen my mower blade. If it's too hard to use, then it's a bastard file. I got the lawn prepped with some Ironite and soil, raked and seeded, put down starter fertilizer and some lawn soil as a topper. Now it's all about water and sunlight. We did get a bit of a warm up over the weekend with high 90's both days and I was able to water the lawn three times to keep the seed moist. Tomorrow is set to be about 99 degrees and then we are set for a cool off with temperatures topping out at 77 degrees on Thursday. I look forward to seeing the grass fill in over the next month.

 

I played golf on Saturday in the Rose Cup Qualifier. I knew going in that I wouldn't be able to qualify as the Rose Cup will again be played on the same week as our Manager's Meeting in Farmington Hills. I suppose that changes the way I play, but I was mostly horrible in shooting a 44+48=92. The whole round changed for me on number 9. I play from the white tees now and all of the guys in my group are white tee players. The Rose Cup is played from the blue tees and the qualifier is as well. On the 9th tee, John got up and hit his drive, followed by Charlie and then me. As soon as I hit the ball I realized that we were at the white tees. John started the parade, but we all followed like sheep. I stopped Dick from teeing off at the wrong tees and he thanked me by telling me that we needed to tee off again from the correct tees and we'd be hitting three. I KNOW that. THANK YOU would have been nice as he had his ball teed up at the white tees when I stopped him. I shot 8 on the par 4 and was four over going into number 9. My round fell apart at that point. I was bad all day and five over after four holes, but had back to back birdies on number 6 and 7 to bring me back  before hitting on nine. I  did win $30 in skins for my two birdies and improved my year long eclectic score to 66. The Eclectic is our best scores on each hole at Diamond Oaks in stroke play events throughout the year.

Church today was the "tithe" talk, where our leaders remind us that this is the only place that God asks us to "test" him. It was a great message with many examples of how God has provided for those that trusted him with their finances. They closed the service with a message from an English pastor on video. He told the story of how a businessman went to a doughnut shop and got a cup of tea and a small bag of doughnuts. The shoppe was packed and he couldn't find a place to sit. He searched and finally found a table for two that one man was sitting at. He approached and the guy waved him in. He busied himself taking off his coat and scarf, setting his briefcase aside and finally sat down to enjoy his tea and doughnuts. He took the bag and selected a doughnut, took a bite and had a refreshing sip of tea, Just then, the man at the table across from him grabbed the bag and took a doughnut. The businessman was shocked, gave him a look and moved the bag of doughnuts over by his tea cup. He selected another doughnut, noticing there was only one left, and placed the bag behind his cup of tea. As he was enjoying his second doughnut, the guy across from him reached across the table and  took the bag, broke the final doughnut in half and placed the other half in the bag and slid it back over by the businessman's cup. The businessman was steamed. He didn't know if the guy was nuts, but didn't want to confront him. The man finished up, got his coat, tipped his cap and left. The businessman didn't want the doughnut the crazy guy had touched. He crumpled up the bag, stood up and put on his coat and scarf and as he reached for his briefcase saw his bag of donuts sitting on top of the case. He hadn't had a guy stealing his doughnuts, the fact was the "crazy" guy was sharing his bag of doughnuts with a stranger. The moral is that all of the doughnuts belong to God.

I hope you all have a good week. Jennifer is back in Vegas after a weekend of celebrating her Mother's 60th birthday in Dallas. We'll call tomorrow and get the scoop on how that went. I know they took a limo Friday night to Billy Bob's and had a big party at Diane's new digs in the Trophy Club on Saturday. Is the Trophy Club a place for men with Trophy wives? Just wondering. Be well. Ciao.

 

 

 

Fall arrives this week, and Autumn too..

 

Darla was treated to a Luke Bryan concert this week by her good friend, Missy. It was Missy's birthday and she asked her husband for tickets to the concert on Thursday night, but asked if she could get two tickets and take Darla. Darla lent Missy some cowboy boots and they headed out to see Little Big Town and Luke Bryan at the Toyota Amphitheater in Wheatland. I guess they had a great time, but had some Amazons show up in front of them and had trouble seeing.  Missy and Darla have been friends for 20 years.

 

I played golf on Thursday in a charity event. Our team shot a 65 and the winners were 58. I did win a closest to the pin (which you can't cheat on) and won a gift card for Home Depot. I used it Thursday afternoon and bought some seed, lawn soil, starter fertilizer and a mill bastard file to sharpen my mower blade. If it's too hard to use, then it's a bastard file. I got the lawn prepped with some Ironite and soil, raked and seeded, put down starter fertilizer and some lawn soil as a topper. Now it's all about water and sunlight. We did get a bit of a warm up over the weekend with high 90's both days and I was able to water the lawn three times to keep the seed moist. Tomorrow is set to be about 99 degrees and then we are set for a cool off with temperatures topping out at 77 degrees on Thursday. I look forward to seeing the grass fill in over the next month.

 

I played golf on Saturday in the Rose Cup Qualifier. I knew going in that I wouldn't be able to qualify as the Rose Cup will again be played on the same week as our Manager's Meeting in Farmington Hills. I suppose that changes the way I play, but I was mostly horrible in shooting a 44+48=92. The whole round changed for me on number 9. I play from the white tees now and all of the guys in my group are white tee players. The Rose Cup is played from the blue tees and the qualifier is as well. On the 9th tee, John got up and hit his drive, followed by Charlie and then me. As soon as I hit the ball I realized that we were at the white tees. John started the parade, but we all followed like sheep. I stopped Dick from teeing off at the wrong tees and he thanked me by telling me that we needed to tee off again from the correct tees and we'd be hitting three. I KNOW that. Thank you would have been nice as he had his ball teed up at the white tees when I stopped him. I shot 8 on the par 4 and was four over going into number 9. My round fell apart at that point. I was bad all day and five over after four holes, but had back to back birdies on number 6 and 7 to bring me back  before hitting on nine. did win $30 in skins for my two birdies and improved my year long eclectic score to 66. The Eclectic is our best scores on each hole at Diamond Oaks in stroke play events throughout the year.

Church today was the "tithe" talk, where our leaders remind us that this is the only place that God asks us to "test" him. It was a great message with many examples of how God has provided for those that trusted him with their finances. They closed the service with a message from an English pastor on video. He told the story of how a businessman went to a doughnut shop and got a cup of tea and a small bag of doughnuts. The shoppe was packed and he couldn't find a place to sit. He searched and finally found a table for two that one man was sitting at. He approached and the guy waved him in. He busied himself taking off his coat and scarf, setting his briefcase aside and finally sat down to enjoy his tea and doughnuts. He took the bag and selected a doughnut, took a bite and had a refreshing sip of tea, Just then, the man at the table across from him grabbed the bag and took a doughnut. The businessman was shocked, gave him a look and moved the bag of doughnuts over by his tea cup. He selected another doughnut, noticing there was only one left, and placed the bag behind his cup of tea. As he was enjoying his second doughnut, the guy across from him reached across the table and  took the bag, broke the final doughnut in half and placed the other half in the bag and slid it back over by the businessman's cup. The businessman was steamed. He didn't know if the guy was nuts, but didn't want to confront him. The man finished up, got his coat, tipped his cap and left. The businessman didn't want the doughnut the crazy guy had touched. He crumpled up the bag, stood up and put on his coat and scarf and as he reached for his briefcase saw his bag of donuts sitting on top of the case. He hadn't had a guy stealing his doughnuts, the fact was the "crazy" guy was sharing his bag of doughnuts with a stranger. The moral is that all of the doughnuts belong to God.

I hope you all have a good week. Jennifer is back in Vegas after a weekend of celebrating her Mother's birthday in Dallas. We'll all tomorrow and get the scoop on how that went. I know they took a limo Friday night to Billy Bobs and had a big party at Diane's new digs in the Trophy Club on Saturday. Is the Trophy Club a place for men with Trophy wives? Just wondering. Be well. Ciao.

 

 

 

Golf, a 70th Birthday Party and NFL Football

I love where we live in Northern California because there are as many golf courses that are located out in the country with views of mountains, lakes, trees and nature as there are neighborhood courses. I enjoy an occasional road trip and some golf out n the country. Paul, Rico and I met at the Park n Ride in Roseville at 9 AM and drove up to Auburn Valley Country Club up in the foothills outside of Auburn. It's about a 40 minute drive and you can see the beautiful vistas that we enjoyed. I had a Groupon for $50 for two of us. Rico was tempted to buy one as well, but try as we might, we were not able to get a fourth player to join us. Auburn Valley is a long, tree lined golf course with a lot of water and narrow fairways. It is really hilly and we were happy to have golf carts as we watched some of the members doing their best billy goat impressions as they climbed the hills in front of us. It was a pleasant day of golf. We all struggled on the front nine as AV has some of the fastest greens in the area and I even started with the dreaded 6-6-6 on my first three holes. I ended up with a 48+41=89. Paul shot 43+45=88 and Rico shot 45+39=84. The course is rated 127 and our home course is 119. The higher the slope, the tougher the course.

 

Charlie's 70th birthday party was starting at 2 PM and I warned them that Darla and I wouldn't be there until after 4 because I was playing golf. Dinner was supposed to arrive at 4, so Frieda wanted us there by 4. We got there at 4:30 and the food arrived about 5 from the barbecue restaurant. Frieda ordered enough food for about twice the number of people she had at the party and she had at least 45 people at the event. We went through the ribs, chicken, biscuits, coleslaw, potato salad and tri-tip and baked beans and when we were all finished she had four extra platters of food that hadn't even been touched. We brought a box of leftovers home with us. Charlie was in his element and enjoying all of his friends and family there feting him. They tried to push him into the pool and he stripped off his shirt and dove in by himself and then sat dripping opening his gifts and cards. Darla and I stayed until about nine and headed home. There were a lot of older folks that were at the party and most of them were gone by six. Frieda would prefer that we stay until midnight, but I had spent the day in the sun and was tired.

 

Jennifer is off next weekend to Dallas to help host her Mom's 60th birthday party with her Step Father, Bob. It is an adults only party so Sam isn't invited. I'm just saying now that if there is a party for me next year and I'll be on a cruise so probably not, but Samantha is not only invited, but it would be a requirement that she be here.

 

I came home Saturday and saw Darla sitting amid a pile of wine. She bought some Converse shoes from Amazon and got a certificate for $100 worth of wine and it had been delivered. I think she got 8 bottles. My question: How expensive were the damn tennis shoes?

 

It is the 15th anniversary of 9-11 today and tell me this, 15 years ago we were brought together as a nation by a tragic and horrific event and one of the things that we all said at that time was "Never Forget." So tell me how 15 little years later we are now bringing Syrian refugees into our country? Apparently our idiot President didn't get the memo. He's the guy that says we are safer now than we were 15 years ago. What is he smoking? And as of today the Wicked Witch of Washington, who coughs and stumbles and trips over her feet, between lies, is 5 points ahead of the Narcissist Republican Nominee. This is a national nightmare and I'm wide awake.

 

Our office ended up with our strongest month in August that we have had in three years. We finished the month with a $188,000 profit. Part of that had to do with a journal entry done by Accounting that closed the gap on an overcharge that was applied to my P&L in October of 2015. Whatever, I'll take it.

 

Darla's Touchstone business is going great. One of the big advantages that she had is that a large leader in the area from Silpada did not join Touchstone and Darla was able to poach all of those representatives and get them to sign up under her. It is going well and she has a great opportunity to win a trip to Jamaica next February. She had a "booking party" on Saturday and the three ladies involved booked nine parties. It's pretty amazing stuff. The jewelry has a lot more color to it and is at a lower price point and she and her group are having tremendous success with the product. I'm very proud of her.

 

I mentioned at the start of this blog entry how I enjoy road trips for golf. Darla and I decided that we would skip the Monterey golf trip this year. The two courses being played are Poppy Hills and Del Monte and I've played both before. We have our trip to Hawaii in December and we want to make a trip to Las Vegas in the next two months, so we are saving the money. I have set up a day trip to Napa on September 30th and there will be four of us that drive down and play the Kennedy Course in Napa and then drive back the same day. I still have an open invitation to go up to Graeagle and play the Whitehawk Ranch course and stay with Uncle Junior. I hope to get that done in October, before the weather gets too cold up there.

 

Well that's it for this week. I still haven't talked to Dad and Shirley as you guys are never home when we call. We will try again in the next few days. I hope everyone is doing well. Sad to see Dallas lose their opener today, but I see a lot of good things coming from the rookie quarterback, Dak Prescott. I also look forward to seeing Zeke Elliott have a breakout game sooner than later. Ciao.

 

 

 



Summer is winding down, sadly.

Labor Day is slowly coming to a close with work back on tap starting tomorrow. It was a tough week at work as we enjoyed our best month in years, but I had to let go one of Darla's friends, a lady who had been doing my typing for the last two years. All of our typing has been outsourced and that comes with a cost. I had gone through metrics with my boss a week ago and it was obvious that I needed to take a close look at one of the measurables that I can control and that is salaries. The last thing I want to do is slow down production, so the underwriting and production roles were safe. I had to decide between the service staff that I have and the obvious spot was the typist, who we had been having handle odd jobs since the typing moved to China. I had to let her go on Thursday and Darla was somewhat upset that I didn't tell her ahead of time, but it was my burden to bear and not hers. It did dampen the mood a bit as this is the front desk person and the first face you see when you walk into my office.

 

I brought the staff together and was very transparent with them about costs and the fact that the average office at Burns does about $1,000,000 per employee and our branch was closer to $890,000. I wanted to impress upon them that this is a one off decision and not a trend that is starting and that I wont be making wholesale changes. The past month is a good indication that we are moving in the right direction and I want our focus to be on retention of existing business and the creation and implementation of new business on the books through marketing, increased service standards and ease of doing business. We now have 27 employees and will write north of  $25,000,000 this year. That works out to about $930,000 per employee, but we are moving in the right direction. Momentum and an office's "vibe" are fragile things and I don't want to derail what we have going. I can't afford to lose anyone right now and I have to keep my finger on the pulse in the office. Frankly, it can be exhausting.

 

The pictures above of the golf and the water are from my marketing trip with Pete Tuesday to Discovery Bay, a planned community off Highway 4 about halfway between Stockton and Concord. There are waterfront homes and a large yacht harbor in the community as well as hundreds of homes. The yacht harbor is the centerpiece of the community, but the golf course is a close second. It had been over ten years since I had played golf at Discovery Bay. Pete had won a silent auction for the green fees, right before he had his injury last year where he tore the tendon in his elbow. The green fees were going to expire on August 31st, so we planned a trip with two of our agents in Roseville to make the trip last Tuesday. The picture of the mini Statue of Liberty was in a back yard off the fifth tee. We had great weather and a tremendous day of golf.

 

The drive from Roseville to Discovery Bay is about an hour and a half. I had the guys (Mark and Phil) meet me at my office and we drove out to Elk Grove and picked up Pete. Actually, we transferred the three sets of clubs from my car into his four door F-150 truck and he drove. We had lunch at the club and then teed off after noon.

 

Darla and I have planned our December trip to Hawaii and will meet her brother Steve and his wife, Kirsten, in Maui the week of December 12th. Darla and I fly in on Friday the 9th and will stay at the Papakea condominium resort on Kaanapali Beach just outside of Lahaina. We found the two bedroom condo on VRBO and will enjoy the trip immensely. Steve and Kirsten live on the big island and we considered going back there, but they were game to island hop to Maui and we were on Kona during our last visit to Hawaii. We were ready for the fun and sun of Maui. We still own a timeshare in Kauai and will return there someday, but have offered up the two timeshares in Puerto Vallarta and Hawaii for the use of the kids. We have those every other year, one even years and the other odd.

 

We also booked our airfare for Florida in March and will fly in on a red eye overnight the night of Thursday March 9th (Dad's 80th birthday) and arrive at about 5 on Thursday. We fly through New York City on Jet Blue, but have a direct flight back on Sunday. We could have flown Jet Blue and arrived on Saturday at 12:30, but thought that was pushing it. We want to talk to Dad and Shirley tonight because we want to book our hotel and will likely stay at the Ramada Inn near the airport and take the shuttle to the Cruiseport the next day. It will be another fun Lyon adventure as we cruise to Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire in March for Dad's 80th  (and my 60th). We look forward to the family time.

 

Saturday Darla worked an event in downtown Sacramento and I did some major trimming in the backyard, thinning out a couple of the gardens and cutting back the neighbor's giant tree that hangs over my pool like a giant sloth. I'm anticipating the deluge of leaves that will be coming soon. I also cleaned out the pool and mowed the lawn. I have fertilized and set the sprinklers to come on more often as the weather is finally becoming more conducive to growing grass. I may re-sod a few areas of the lawn next month and see if we can get it going again. Some of the area is now just green painted dirt.

 

 I relaxed in the pool afterward and Darla got home about six. I offered to take her to dinner, but I wanted to go to Mimi's. She thinks it is a place for old people and I submit that the older crowd does like the menu because there is so much comfort food on the menu. I just wanted to go get a bowl of their Tillamook Cheese and chicken mac and cheese. It is delicious and one of my go to foods that Pete and I enjoy when we go out to eat. There were the geriatric crowd in attendance, but we sat next to several couples and a large group of family members celebrating their son's birthday. Darla seemed to enjoy her salad, but I know she enjoyed the Samuel Adams French Onion soup, as we were supposed to share it and I got a couple of spoonfuls and then she took it away and said I was eating too much of the cheese. The picture of us together was taken by a very harried server.

 

Sunday was our Labor Day golf tournament and Bob Pando was coming into town. I set up with Neil to have Bob play in the first tee time with him so Bob could be in the restaurant afterward to see and greet all of his old friends. Neil said he understood why Bob should be in the first group, but why did I have to? Smartass. We had a good time, but it has been awhile since I've played golf with Neil and I see that he is having some issues with being aware of everything around him. There were a few times that he pulled his cart in front of Bob or I when we were hitting and one time that he drove off into the fairway before Bob had a chance to tee off. We were walking and Bob wanted to know if this was normal for Neil. I told him that I hadn't played with him for awhile, so I didn't know. We played with Neil, who is 74 and Andy who is 81 and they both got really tired by the end of the round.

 

I shot a pedestrian 87, Neil shot 88 and Andy struggled to 102. Bob said not to expect much from him as he hadn't been playing. He shot 40 on the front and seemed to be okay, but had used up all of his 4 strokes that he is allotted. He came alive on the back nine and had three birdies and shot 34 for a 74. It was amazing to watch. I birdied number 17 and won $28 in skins from that hole alone. Bob, being Bob, also won the 50-50 drawing that we do at every tournament as a fundraiser for the Christmas Party and took home $90. It was a fun day. I stayed the whole day as Darla was working the event downtown again and helped pay out skins, post scores on the big scoreboard and read scores all day to Neil so he could get them in the computer. I then got home and Neil sent me the scores to record in our GHIN scoring application. I took care of that today, updated our tournament handicaps for the website and sent out to the hole by hole scores on Excel to our webmaster for updating our yearlong Eclectic scores that track the best scores on each hole at Diamond Oaks for each individual.

 

My back continues to be sore and I will try to stay off the golf course all this week. I do play on Saturday however. The problem has been that I hadn't golfed for three weeks with the golf event I worked and our vacation and I haven't stopped playing since I got back. I've been averaging about three rounds a week and I need to rest my back. I will see Jane again later in September and get yelled at.

 

I am into the dentist this week for another crown. I usually make it about three years and then another old filling starts falling apart and the dentist can make another yacht payment because I need a new crown. That will be Wednesday.

 

Darla and I just relaxed today. I watched the Fed Ex Cup golf playoffs this morning while working on the club scores and then we relaxed on the pool and I read while Darla talked to various friends on the cell. We were supposed to be at the last game of the River Cats season (the Giants AAA team). We had set up to introduce one of Darla's girlfriends to one of my agents. Both are divorced and coincidentally both were born in Mexico and emigrated to the United States (legally I might add). Unfortunately, Darla's girlfriend had a bout of nose bleeds this weekend that caused her to see the doctor and is on medication She didn't want to commit to going and have the nosebleeds still be an issue, so a rain check was arranged. Without Phil and Carmen joining us, we tried in vain to give the tickets away, but had no takers. Too bad as they are great seats. I may let them go next year as they weren't used enough this year for agent appreciation by the staff and sort of turned into "four tickets for family and friends". That is not why I pay for season tickets, so need to rethink this for 2017.

 

Well, that is it for now. I hope you are all doing well, enjoyed the Labor Day and are ready for Autumn. It is coming. Ciao.