One week of school left, oh boy. Then kids are then off until January 7th! I’ll be traveling in the new year before they go back to school. I sure don’t remember being off that long when I was a kid.
The boys both did great scoring 100% on their spelling and mid term tests. I picked them up at 4 as they also have chess club on Fridays.
Lori and I made a Costco trip yesterday to get some stuff for our annual Christmas party next Friday. The temps are supposed to be 30 for the high and 15 for the low so I imagine it’ll be 20 degrees or so in the evening. I’m setting up a fire pit in the front yard next to the Paella Tent where Megan (our girl from the restaurant) will be cooking away. We’re excited for this as it’s something different from the normal italian fare we serve each year. The other plus is I don’t have to pick up and then drop off the food and serving dishes.
Today I need to help Lori put up garland around the doors. We have lots to do before Christmas. I’m thinking of getting Jag the new Microsoft Surface which is essentially a tablet type computer. I don’t know if I can swing it as they’re $350 but after talking to Microsoft, it is a good tool for students. We know he’ll play some games on it but he does that now on our computers and their video consoles. The upside is he’d actually be using programs like Word and Excel and in this day and age, you can’t start kids too young as computer skills are a necessity. We’ll see, I’m trying to make a little money on the side by doing a wine tasting or two between now and Christmas.
Our friends from Aspen who also have a home in Sarasota Florida called yesterday and said they think they threw out their $1500 Bocelli tickets for the show tonight in Tampa, as they can’t find then anywhere! Boy are they lucky I’m so connected (ha ha) as I managed to reach my good friend Pete who is the Worldwide tour manager who called Adam (my other buddy who works for the promoter) who is having the ticket agency cancel the 4 tickets and reprint them and then leave them at Will Call for our friends. Pete was leaving Washington D.C. en route to Florida and thankfully on their plane there are no restrictions on cell phone or laptop use so I managed to reach him in the air. I think Pete and I are hooking up for dinner or something when I’m in New York after the tour is over in January. He’s a great guy we’ve worked with for about 3 years now and has saved my butt a number of times. It seems I always have some wayward guest at each show that Pete gets to their seat or backstage for me whenever I call.
Lori had a scare yesterday but it turns out it was just a wheat headache. Any headache she gets scares her (understandably so) as she thinks the 3 year pain is coming back. Turns out she ate some chocolate that had some wheat in it.
I’m staying away from politics for the season but here’s a dire warning. 2014 is going to be a year of economic unrest. Don’t let the stock market fool you as what happens there has nothing to do with what happens in our daily lives. When the gov stops printing and injecting  money (currently $85 Billion a month) into our economy, things are going to get bad. They’re sending test signals to the markets now saying they will taper, or slow down, this cash infusion, to see how the markets will react, and the news is not good. Throw in China now passing the U.S. dollar with their currency being traded more than ours and trouble is brewing. I know this doesn’t mean much to most or all of you and you probably don’t care but you need to make some changes to stay ahead of the never ending game governments and bankers are playing.
Health care is the biggy! The gov is trying to nationalize our health care. Even though Obamacare was born as a law, the Pres has changed it so many times through Executive Order by moving key requirements and granting waivers to political groups, it’s hardly recognizable from what it first was. The administration is now telling insurance companies what to do, like they own them, mandating they cover people January 1 even if they haven’t signed up. This is all because only 350,00 out of the needed 7 million have signed up! Watch for a huge campaign in ads trying to get people to sign up. They’re using celebrities to do so and we (the taxpayers) are paying for it all. Its propaganda in its purest form. Never before has the U.S. Government resorted to such pandering at the taxpayers expense to push their agenda. Don’t be fooled , their end goal is a single payer system where we all have the same insurance plan and all wait in the same line and have the same coverage and doctors. Hospitals and doctors are pissed off as they should be. I personally know some doc’s that are retiring due to all of this. It will not be pretty so stay healthy!
Ok, that’s enough politics for the day, I’ll try to abstain until the New Year but don’t ignore what’s going on around you or you will be caught off guard and be sorry.
Have a great weekend and God Bless.