Finally a nice stetch of comfortable weather

 

Back at it on a Sunday night. The Dallas Cowboys are messing up a perfectly harmless preseason game with horrendous play on special teams and offense. The defense looks really good and gives me hope for the coming year.

 

We had David and Daniel's cousin, Taylor, come and visit us on Saturday. I had golf and the family ended up going to see Luke play soccer and then off to Folsom Lake for the final weekend that boats are allowed to drive over 5 MPH as they begin to lower the lake level for Winter flood control.  I had our Invitational golf event and had Pete from the office as my guest. The other pictures are of our date Friday night which was dinner out to celebrate our 22nd wedding anniversary. I made a collage of the pictures taken at our table. Darla is standing and I'm sitting because she is in her 50's and I'm 61. The last picture is a shot I got of Samson relaxing on the couch with his head on the arm of the sofa.

 

Darla and I went to dinner Friday night to celebrate our anniversary which was actually Thursday night, but I had the next to last week of my golf twilight league that night. I got off a little bit early on Friday and we headed out to Lincoln and dinner at one of our favorite restaurants. We enjoyed a split plate of Gnocchi and Chicken Saltimbocca. They had a small group playing at the restaurant and it was a pleasant night.

 

Pete and I played together on Saturday. He had taken his clubs in to be re-gripped during the week. He planned to pick them up on Saturday morning. Now, a bit of ancient history. I had ordered a new driver about two years ago and when it came in, Pete accepted it from UPS, took it into his office and removed the driver and left just the packing material and the head cover in the box and he resealed it and brought it to my office. Funny guy. I opened the box and had a fit. Meanwhile, Pete went back to his office and back to work. I called the shop that sent me the club and UPS and raised holy h*ll. I put a claim in with UPS and fumed. Pete came back in about fifteen minutes later with the club and was quite amused with himself. I was less so. I called UPS and told them "good news and bad news". The good news was the club had been found, the bad news was the idiot that hid it had been fired. I filed that one and prepared for payback some time in the future.

 

My chance came this week. I played Thursday night and talked to the guys in the shop and took possession of Pete's driver. I met him early Saturday as we were meeting our agent Ron and his partner for breakfast. Pete went into the pro shop to get his clubs and I followed with him. The guys working had no idea that I had the driver and it turns out that one of the guys was the guy who had actually re-gripped his clubs. He got the irons and handed them over. Pete looked at them and said, "I had a driver as well." The guy looked all over and headed into the back office. I followed him and clued him in on what was going on. He asked if I wanted him to "mess" with Pete. Oh yeah. He came out and said that somehow the driver had been sold. Pete got a little exercised and said,"Well, you guys owe me a driver." I said actually they owe you whatever they got for the driver. Mike played right along and said, "Yeah, we sold it for $17.50." I almost died laughing at the look on Pete's face. He started to complain and I stopped him and reminded him of his little stunt in the office and let him know I had his club. It went off better than I could have planned.

 

Pete is a 19 handicap and we had a 17 team handicap. We played well and shot a 76, net 59 and felt pretty good about ourselves until we got in and saw the 51, two 54s and a 56 on the score sheet. The event was a lot of fun and they had some contest holes. On one of them, it was a 115 yard par three and you had to roll dice to see what club you had to play with. You had to play that club all the way through the hole, including putting. I ended up with a 6 iron and hit a sawed off swing and the ball hit about 40 yards short of the green and rolled up to 3 feet 6 inches away. Someone came in behind me at 3 feet 4 inches. The 18th hole had a collection of persimmon drivers and if you used one to tee off with, you got a free hit. Those old drivers don't fly well and we ended up about 255 yards from the green on a par 4. Because we laid zero, we managed to get on the green in 2 and got our 4. It was fun, but we didn't win anything. I had a great time with Pete and Ron.

 

We got called this week and will get our new sliders installed on Labor Day. They have crews working and they will be here early and tear out the old sliders and put in new ones. They will do everything except the finish on the exterior as the city inspector has to come out and look at the weatherization and sign off on that Tuesday. They will be back on Wednesday to finish the job. I also got a quote from Chad on our other windows and he will be by on Monday to get the contract signed and order those windows. Hopefully he can have that completed before Dad and Shirley come as well.

 

I bought Darla a new laptop as hers was on the fritz and we went big and got her a nice MacBook Pro by Apple. Now she has an iPhone, an iPad, and the Mac book and they all talk to each other and share files and pictures, etc. It is a really nice addition to her work equipment.

 

I will call a halt to this as it is halftime and there are hamburgers to grill. I hope all are well and I will be back at this on Labor Day next week as it is a holiday and I want to get some pictures of the slider work. Have a great week. Ciao.

 

FINALLY..some cooling coming our way

 

 

At it again on a Monday night. Darla is off picking up some tortilla chips to go with our taco soup tonight.

 

The pictures. The top two are of Samantha's new pup, Bootsy. Jennifer and McKenny went out to the SPCA over the weekend and found this little Border Collie that was underweight and somewhat malnourished. They brought Maceo with them and the shelter workers remarked that Maceo hasn't missed any meals. I think that might have helped them get the dog. She is only 3 months old and they are in for the puppy experience, both good and bad. The next four pictures are from Saturday night at Jesse's Grove winery where Darla set up as a vendor during the concert. The bands were both good, Cripple Creek and Whiskey Dawn. The 4th picture in the series shows Darla, Alicia, Shawna and Connie. All three women work for me and Alicia is now working for Darla as well in her jewelry business. Shawna is her Mom. Connie's husband, Kip, makes wine stoppers and Darla invited him along as a vendor. He had a very SLOW night as most of the people who stopped and looked at his stoppers made the same comment, that they don't have any wine left over when they drink and have no need for a stopper. Darla had a great night with about $1300 in sales and felt for Kip and bought 5 of his wine stoppers for $100. He had them priced at $25 each and you got a discount the more you bought. The vendor next to us saw us buying and came over and bought three of the stoppers themselves and that turned out to be the sum total of Kip's sales. The last two pictures are of Samson in a pencil drawing and one of Samson fast asleep on Darla and Darla not far behind him.

 

We stayed until just about the end of the concert and ducked out right as Whiskey Dawn was doing their encore. It was a nice night with a slight breeze and temperatures that started out at 100 degrees and ended up about 75 degrees by 9:45. You can see the top picture of the booth and how crowded it gets. It is the reason that Darla needs someone like Alicia to help her with sales.

 

I played golf Sunday with Darla's business coach. I met him here when he was working with Darla. She had the great idea that he work with me and that I could start a consulting business and continue to work after I retire. Uh, no. I will have worked for 49 straight years when I retire and I think I've earned the rest. He had said that he was an active member at Morgan Creek, which is a high end country club here in Roseville that was very poorly run on the golf side and eventually sold to a local golf investor that opened the course to the public and basically killed the members who paid upwards of $20,000 to buy into the club. He quit the club and is understandably unhappy. He says that he was a 7 handicap when he played there and is up to a 9. We went up to Darkhorse Golf Club up in Auburn. Darkhorse is a tough venue, but also very pretty in the foothills. There is a lot of elevation change and the views are very nice.

 

John, who is Darla's coach struggled on the tough track and shot 98. Paul shot 89, I managed a 92 and our fourth (a friend of John's) shot 112. We played a game o 6-6-6 where we switch partners every 6 holes and all end up playing on the same team. We bet $5 each 6 holes and I ended up winning all three segments and the other guys all owed me $5, so I took $15. I feel like I regressed a little on my game this week, but the slope is 132 at Darkhorse and it is 6,500 yards. Our course is 119 and 6,100 yards. A little different.

 

I had our neighborhood friend, Chad, over last Thursday and he measured for windows. We are having Anderson put in our sliders and I want Chad, who is a licensed contractor, to replace 7 windows on the back side of the house. We are looking at Pella windows. I should have a price this week. We won't get the work done before Dad and Shirley get here , but I'm looking forward to seeing the result. I may move the barbecue that sits right outside the bay windows. Right now the large middle window is a sliding window with a screen. We are changing that out to a large picture window that will overlook the pool.

 

This weekend is our Invitational and I have Pete coming out to play with me in the two man scramble. John wants to join the club and another guy in my office. You can join the week of the Invitational for the renewal rate AND you will get the rest of this year plus all of next year. It's a good deal. Pete and I will play with my twilight partner (and Pete's agent) Ron and his partner.

 

That will do it for another week. I think that Taylor will be in town this weekend to visit the boys and will be over swimming with us. I'll get pictures and be back at this next weekend. I hope everyone is great. Ciao.

 

 



No Pictures this week, just words

 

So back at it a day late and, as the title reads, no pictures.

 

It was a busy weekend with poker on Friday night and golf on Saturday. With the tournament on Saturday morning I brought just iced tea to drink at the game. It was one of those poker runs, where I couldn't catch a cold. I got there at 7 PM and we played until 8:45 and then broke for dinner. I had not won a single hand in the 105 minutes that I played. I was down about $50 and not feeling too good about cards. I brought about $90 in quarters and was ready to make it an early night. We had some chili with Fritos and sour cream, diced onions and cheddar cheese. It was good and my luck started to change. I won the second hand when we returned to cards. My luck was better, but not great on the second half of cards and I ended up losing about $35 on the night. The poker is really secondary. I always want to win, but the chance to visit with these men and share our lives is what is the best part of our poker nights. Steve wouldn't agree and he's ALL about the cards, but we truly enjoy the laughs.

 

I played at 9:05 on Saturday morning and the guy that I was playing is not a regular golfer in the club. He makes sure that he gets his five play dates a year and then he qualifies for the club championship. With the regular golfers we have a better idea if they are manipulating their handicap. This guy may not be, but he hits the ball a mile off the tee. He is a blue tee golfer and was regularly hitting the ball past my drives from the white tees. I decide to just play my game and let the chips fall where they landed. I actually beat him on the front nine and was 1 up after 9. I shot 40 to his 41. On the back nine, he really heated up and had a stretch on 10-14 where he went par-bogey-par-birdie-birdie. I went bogey, bogey, double bogey-bogey-par to fall three down with four to play. I was pretty down and he was one under on the back to my +5. I was able to make a game of it and hit my next drive on the par three to 8 feet (closest to the pin on the day) and parred the hole to get back to two down. I parred the par five 16th to match him and end up dormie in the match. I finished par-bogey to his bogey-bogey and tied him at all square after 18 (I had q stroke on 18).. It was a fierce come back and I think I used up all of my mojo. Both Paul and Ron, who had won their matches earlier,  jumped in a cart and followed me in the playoff and Steve, who I had ridden with on the day, lost on 18, but decided to ride along as well. He hit first and had a soaring drive that hit the trees on the left side of the fairway. I hit a good drive that was about 125 yards in. We got up and helped him look for his ball in the trees and couldn't find it. I looked out in the fairway and there it was about 80 yards from the green. Nothing like a little good luck in a playoff, eh? I managed to smother my wedge shot and left it short of the green in a divot. He hit a beautiful shot hat landed about three feet from the hole and stopped dead. I had to put my chip close and hope he missed his put. Unfortunately, the lie was awful and I skulled the ball across the green. I chipped to about 12 feet and made the putt for five. He got up and knocked in the three footer for the win.

 

I shook hands with him and he said, "I beat you two up". Uh, no, he beat me after 19, 1 up. He said I had 3 and you had 5. Yep. He was a little confused on the concept, but it showed him winning after 19 in the posted results. I shot 83 and 82 in the tournament and although I had a few putts I'd like to have back, I really couldn't have played much better. My net scores for the two days were 66 and 65. Unfortunately, he shot an 80, net 65 as well on Saturday. I hated missing the final on Saturday, but David (who beat me) went on to win our flight, so it was all good. That couple of weeks that I took off while Sam was here really helped to refocus me and I have slowed down my swing and I'm really working on my tempo and it is working. I'm trending to a 15.4 golf index and am down from a high of 19.1 in May. That was when it was a real struggle for me. Now it seems to be coming a lot easier and I'm much more confident.

 

We had Darla's parents over on Sunday for a barbecue dinner. We had planned to swim and relax, but got into a serious conversation about life and family and we never made it out of the family room. I finally got up and got the hamburgers on the grill and Darla served the potato salad. We didn't get the cell phones out and take pictures as the conversation was so intense. We talked about church and their new pastor and our new pastor and it was a nice family time.

 

 I had put the water on in the pool to top it off and forgot about it (always set a timer). The water is right at the top of the tile line and just short of the overflow pipe. I doubled down on my mistake when I turned on the front sprinklers when we got back from the park with Sam and remembered right before I went to bed and the water was pouring down the street. It was a big oops night.

 

Darla has finished up her painting in the kitchen and I put up new curtain rods and curtains on the windows. We have one of the windows that has an air lock leak and is cloudy that I need to get fixed. I had planned on the guy here in the neighborhood doing the work, but he hasn't called me back. I'd like to get those done soon as we will get the sliders in later this month.

 

Well, this is short, but I am short on news. Samantha started fifth grade today. Can you believe that? The girl is growing up fast. Have good week and I'll return for more next week. Ciao.

 

 

 

 

 



Smoky California

 

 

Back at it on a Sunday night. I'm a little tired from golf today, but it is a good thing as the numbers added up for me.

 

The pictures. Willie from last Sunday night. He is really starting to slow down and has been sick of late. He only played about an hour and 10 minutes and waived goodnight and was gone. No encore or anything. The second picture is Darla and I at the concert. The next three are from our dinner out Friday night with Vance and Terralee, friends from church. They had called and asked us to join them for dinner. It turns out they were not only out celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary, but it was actually their 50th on Friday. We met them through a bible study and have remained friends for about 10 years. They are in the process of selling their house and moving back to Oregon where their kids and grand kids live. We were honored to have been chosen to join them on Friday night. The final picture gives you a view of what we have been dealing with for weeks now. The wildfires in California have trapped the smoke and it is being pushed back and forth by the air currents. Some days we have sun and clear nights and others ash and a blotted out sun.

 

Darla and I went to her jewelry gig last night at the winery in Lodi and the winds came up in the afternoon and blew all of the smoke to the north. It was a beautiful night with a light breeze and the temperatures dropped into the mid seventies by 9:00 PM. On the drive home north on Interstate 5 you could see a defined line of smoke across the northern valley. I know that our discomfort with the fires which are ash and respiratory issues are small compared to the impact of lost homes and livelihoods for people in the line of the fires. The Carr fire which spreads from Shasta County all the way to Mendocino county is now the 3rd largest fire ever in California. It has been burning for 2 weeks and is only 17% contained. There are four other major fires burning in the state and the fire in the central valley actually closed Yosemite for a week which is unprecedented.

 

It was smoky today and we did have a bit of a breeze, but it was hot and I was suffering in the smoke. My game was very good and I shot 40+42=82 to beat my opponent 3 and 2 in the match play event. I took a three up lead with three to play and then pulled my drive left into a canal that is red staked, so a hazard. I had to take a drop and then play my third to about 160 yards on the par five. I was able to get the ball on the green in four and then sank a 30 foot putt for par to tie him on the hole and win the match three up with 2 holes to play. Fun stuff.  I play David, who beat his opponent 2 and 1 today and shot an 81, on Saturday and if I win, play the winner of another match that will play in our foursome for the championship in our flight. I had two birdies in today's match.

 

My game is coming around and I played well on Thursday night in league. We played Charlie's team. Charlie has been in Colorado on a family emergency and his partner sent me a note and told me that he had a 2 handicap subbing for him. As it turned out, my partner Ron was on a business trip to LA and I needed a sub. I talked to Rico who I play with a lot and he agreed to sub Thursday night. Rico is a 4. It was fun watching those guys go at it that night. David (Charlie's sub) had a stretch of three straight birdies and put us behind and then Rico hit the par 5 6th in two and made the putt for eagle and then had two birdies down the stretch to shoot 34. David shot 36 and I shot 40. Joe, Charlie's partner, shot 44 and watched us beat them. It was fun to watch two really good golfers at their best that night, Rico really enjoyed himself and wants to play in the league next year.

 

Darla has been on a buying binge and creative binge lately. She has painted the kitchen hutch purple and now is painting the kitchen dinette area with bay windows a turquoise green color. When her creative streak comes out I just stay out of the way. Her colors are wild, but generally look pretty good when all is said and done. We have the new sliders being installed later this month and she is planning on putting in new window treatments on the windows in the bedroom and in the living room and kitchen dining area.

 

I edited the picture to take out the pile of stuff sitting on the table as the job is still being worked on. She also bought some rattan sofas for the outside area. It looks nice.

 

 

I redid the sealant on the stamped concrete this weekend and it looks shiny and fresh.

 

 

Work continues to shine. Our numbers look really solid after the first three days and new business needs to stay strong. It's hard to grow right now in personal lines because of the fires. We cannot bind coverage on an new home if it is within 30 miles of an active fire. There are so many fires that it is having an effect on our business. I suppose business that might otherwise be moved is renewing with us, because insurance law does not allow you to get off an account that is currently within 20 miles of an active fire, so we are keeping those accounts.

 

As I mentioned earlier, I don't think we will be attending any more Willie Nelson concerts. His voice was particularly weak during the concert and he had been sick and the fires were really bad up in the Reno area. The city was socked in with smoke while we were there. Alison Krause was excellent and we really enjoyed her set. She came out to sing "Will the Circle be Unbroken", which is a great Old Opry favorite by the Carter family, with Willie. It was a lot like going to church there for a bit. Very enjoyable.

 

I will wrap this up for the week and I will be back next Sunday to let you know how I fare in the Club Championship event. Be well. Ciao.