New Beginnings

I wrote this note to Carol and the boys in one of the few sandy beaches we came across during my adventure trip to the Emerald Isle of Ireland After talking about a hiking trip in Ireland for a long time, I can mark this long-awaited adventure off my bucket list. It was without a doubt a beautiful place to travel and visit, and also the folks there are very friendly and I am glad I went and I would love to return one day to see some of the things I missed on this trip. Ireland has postcard-perfect landscape beauty, a very diverse lifestyle and I loved every minute of it, but it simply cannot compete head-to-head with the fairy tale beauty of New Zealand. With that being said Ireland does have its advantage over the more beautiful New Zealand. Primarily because of their centuries long battles and bloody history here, everywhere; every town, village and person I spoke with has a direct clan connection to this long and pugnacious past of Ireland. For the trip I signed up for wa...

   A number of years later, in February of 2018, I was in Las Vegas at an industry trade show for a few days. The first night there was the end of a long day and I was very tired. I had a vendor visit and meal at the restaurant in the Bellagio Casino Hotel. We finished up about 11:45 pm local time which would have been 1:45 am to me with the time change difference. I had left the table just as we were finishing up and went to the men's room. I left my phone on the table with the company I was with so I knew it would be safe. The only thing left to do that evening was to step out to the Strip in front of the Bellagio to watch the music choregraphed water fountain show for a few minutes before heading to the hotel a few blocks down the street. As I left the men's room, my company was standing outside the entrance of the dining room. We gathered up to say goodnight and we walked out the door as the restaurant was closing as we were leaving. We walked out of the hotel and toward t...

 In July 2014, Brad and I took a Dad and Son trip to Washington DC. With him having a History major in college, I knew he would love this trip. I capitalized on the knowledge I gathered when Carol Ann and I took this same trip a couple of years earlier. We stayed at the same hotel in Alexandria and used the same subway access across the parking lot of the hotel for our trips into DC.  While he and I visited many of the same sites Carol Ann and I visited, we hit a few sites that we missed. One of those places was the National Spy Museum (who knew there was an entire museum dedicated to spies?) There was a lot of spy history here surrounding the American Revolution, the Civil War, Mafia, as well as Political spies both past and present. And as you can imagine a huge gift store with all kinds of silly souvenirs to buy. One of the silly disguise items we saw and just had to try out was a pair of dark sunglasses with an integrated mustache. We both tried them on, had a couple of l...

                       The picture above is my house that has become my "retirement home" and I am very happy with that. One of the things I wanted to do upon retirement was to start reading the many books I have amassed over the years. I started the first few months each morning with a couple of devotional books and a book I got from my brother Mike about the sinking of an American Nuclear Sub in 1968. The book is full of detailed information that was historically accurate and fascinating. I remember this event when it happened though not widely discussed and now I know why. But as the days got warmer and longer I was spending more time outside on projects that I have had planned for many years and I started to fade on my morning routine. I have several books in the queue but have read only this one.  The other thing I wanted to do was to journal my activities each day as I transition from decades of a very demanding work...

 The month of July has come and gone and it was a good month. I cannot believe how the days, weeks and months seem to fly by. I was a bit concerned about how I would fill my time in retirement after such a demanding and hectic work schedule for nearly 50 years. So far it has been a very enjoyable time of life. Carol and I have our hobbies and we continue to enjoy the time together and the time we take for those hobbies. The temperatures were mild for most of the entire month and that was an unexpected pleasure. We even had a few inches of rain in the early part of the month which is very uncommon. The high temps stayed in the mid 90s and I am pretty happy with that. While we all know of the July 4 holiday, the day we celebrate our separation from the rule of England as a new and independent nation, our neighbors must have read a different history book, as they celebrate Independence Week and a Half 😲! The fireworks started the last weekend in June with the annual show sponsored by...

   The big news today was Hurricane Beryl making landfall on the Texas coast at about 5 am this morning as a category 1 with 80 mph sustained winds. The good news is there was no property damage to the kids' home, rather flooding of the back of their yard. Jacob and Lauren were as prepared as they could be for their first hurricane in their new home. The rain and the wind hit their place in Montgomery very early this morning and they lost power about 8 am. The majority of their back yard was flooded almost knee deep over most of the yard however, the house pad elevation was substantial enough to be safe from flooding they had today. A tree at the end of their street was knocked down and was laying on the high voltage power utility lines. They can get out in the case of emergency but would likely cause damage to their car. The power utility has a crew dispatched for their area so hopefully they will get their power back and the tree out later today or early tomorrow. The clinic...