Bob And Susan

Susan and I are grandparents! We are proud to announce the birth of Ava Anne Gureatsa, born March 4th (6.98 lbs.). She and Mother Rheanna and Dad Mat are all happy and healthy, as we all are. What a wonderful time it is for our family. I’ll get a couple pictures up soon, but not today.
Today is for thoughts, a time to just say how happy I am, how proud I am and to try and finally write a blog since Joe. Jeff, who pays for this has been so polite in not even mentioning the fact that we haven’t used this site for some time. Well, time does heal, and a change in life can come in different ways. So now we feel the joy of life’s many changes, and embrace Ava Anne.
To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose. A time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant, a time to reap, a time to laugh and a time to weep. Now the tears are happy!
Love Bob

I know I have not written for quite some time. I have been

quite sad about Joe. It’s allowed. I can’t possibly sit here

and write a bunch of stuff about Joe. If you want to ask me

anything about Joe, I am easily found.  Susan and I just

got  through Christmas. If you didn’t know Susan and

Joe’s  relationship, I can tell you that they both made each

other smile,  they loved each other, we’re very special

friends to each other.

 So I as I reflect today on New Years Eve, I wait for Joe

to come up the driveway.  I’ve been waiting for months,

still a no show. I’ve never been so sad. If I ever was so sad,

I would know that Joe  would be driving up the driveway

to be there for me. Where’s Joe?

Thanks to all of my family and friends. You guys are so

great! So perceptive about this aging hardass and his tears.

Susan, Susan, Susan…..I Love You

Happy New Year In 2010.

Give Peace  A Chance

In pursuit of retirement options, we went to Florida last week to visit Bev & Ron, (Susan’s parents) and while having a wonderful visit with them and enjoying their wonderful hospitality, we considered buying their place as a snowbird home when they were done with it. We decided very quickly that this wasn’t for us. A couple reasons: It would limit us to travel to many places we still want to go, when you pay for this you feel obligated to go there. We found that there were many homes available for rent as vacation properties, all around, Florida, just as there are in Arizona, Mexico etc. Maybe rent an RV, and do Newfoundland, and Maine. So many options and we want to check that out. If I’m 70, maybe I’ll thnk about a more permanent winter home.
Other: Dragged the tiller through the snow so Susan could plant her red onions. She’s very excited about gardening this year so I am grateful that the work I did yesterday didn’t hurt my back, and ,the chiropractor I now have has helped me out a lot. We have so many things on our plate, but we’ll keep them in moderation and enjoy life in the meantime. I have to rebuild the tractor, put a roof on the deck, rebuild the driveway, go see the girls, go to Ontario , and go see a Bears game with a couple friends at the end of September. It’s, as Rheanna would say All Good.
Bailey has lost a little weight, Susan and the vet think we should just give her more food. I worry somtimes when I come home from work and she greets me that she is going to eat me. You see…. she’s much closer to Susan than me.
I have a facebook page and I have very little time for it. We have dial up internet, which would drive anybody nuts, and I have our email, and this blog. That’s enough….so I pay little attention to Facebook and end up feeling guilty to all those who are trying to be my friend and I don’t have time to respond. Most importantly I have a phone, and that will always be the best means of communication.
Love Bob

It’s been a while since anything has been written here so I don’t know that anybody is looking anymore. Susan is in to Facebook big time and I’ve had nothing inspiring to write about. Perhaps it’s the long winter we’ve had. I’m going to throw up a few pictures. One was taken a couple days ago. It’s indicative of this winter. It was less than one week before the first day of spring. What does that amount of snow have to do with global warming? Attention Al Gore, recheck your facts.
I’ve also posted up a picture of Bailey enjoying the lack of global warming.
She loves to sit or lay outside in the snowpile on the deck. It gives her a much better view of the land from up there. All the better to take care of us. I’ve also tried to post a picture of my two lovely daughters (Lindsay & Rheanna) but it won’t seem to post although if you go to Susan & Bob’s pictures, it made it in there.

So I got to the store to get ink for our Epson printer and she rings it in at $90.00. As I groan I happen to look over and see that there is a HP printer with ink on sale for $19.00. so I bought the printer and will now recycle the old one. Every once in a while I see things that make me think the world’s gone nuts.

I’ve had quite a few experiences over the years in buying tickets from scalpers. I’ve bought them for hockey, baseball, and football, both here in Canada and in the US. I’ve always gotten tickets, they’ve always been really good seats, and the prices are always cheaper than the internet ticket you will find. The big problem people have is they don’t  want to spend  all that time and money travelling somewhere and find out they couldn’t get tickets and end up watching the game in their hotel room. I’m here to tell you that won’t or at least shouldn’t happen. Here’s what I’ve learned…..

Get out of your cab at least 3-4 blocks from the stadium. Every city has different laws, some say it’s illegal, some say it’s illegal to make a profit, some don’t care. Scalpers do stand right out front of a stadium at times, others will be a couple blocks away. What are you looking for?  You want the guys with a mitt full of tickets and lots of bling. He’s a pro and pros don’t rip people off, it’s their living. They are tough to negotiate with but persevere, they want to make a sale. If an individual is selling a pair of tickets be careful. They may be stolen. Scalpers don’t sell stolen tickets because you could go and find him again the next week. I’ve bought tickets from a woman who’s husband had to work late and she was trying to sell them. That felt safe to me. One other thing to watch is the bait and switch. You are looking at two tickets with good seats but when you leave the scalper you don’t even notice until your in the stadium, you are now sittting in the boonies as he switched the tickets while you were paying him. Again, the pros don’t do this as a rule, but it’s something to watch out for. Here’s some examples of where I’ve been and what I paid. Keep in my mind I aways for football like to be at around mid field 20-25 rows up. I have nearly always gotten the best ticket available, quite often player’s tickets. In Seattle I just paid $40. for $50. Mariners tickets and sat behind the Twins dugout. Keep in mind this is a lousy Seattle team, hence the cheaper tickets. Bears preseason tickets I paid 90 for $100 tickets, again this is preseason. In Denver for a Sunday night game when it was snowing I paid face value, great seats, but it was snowing. San Fran I paid face value, and had Jeff Garcia’s father sitting behind me. Great seats. One time I paid 240 for Monday night in Oakland. I never talked to a scalper for fear of what might have been.

These scalpers are fast talking and street wise. They like to play the part so let them do so. Try not to be unreasonable with your bids so they don’t walk away. You must at least offer face value for an NFL regular season game because it’s only going to go up. Green Bay is coming to Seattle this year, a good seat would have been 250 or so. But with no Brett and a  couple losses you may find a real good set for 150 on game day. Not on the net as right now 150 will probably get you a nose bleed. I’ve got a scalper in Seattle who has a web site and cell you can get in touch with should you ever want to. As you can see all my expereinces have been good ones. I too know what it costs to go and stay for a night and would never want to get skunked but so far I haven’t and I’m optimistic enough to continue going with out tickets and knowing I should get some.

In all the years we’ve lived here we still never take the beauty for granted. An example of this would be our recent boat ride down the Kootenay River. We just love it. We go between the dams, those being South Slocan to Brilliant. It’s very quiet as there is little boat traffic. The pictures you see are of the area. In one picture you can see the Glade ferry in our wake. We’ve even found a waterfall that you can only get to by boat. The water is most times like a sheet of glass. Actually if it is rough we don’t bother going out. The river is only a couple minutes from our home. It’s no wonder we see so many tourists/motorhomes in the area. Nice to live here. We love it and you can see why.

I’m so lucky to have Susan and her green thumbs working on the gardens. She works very hard and I wanted to post some pictures to show what a wonderful job she’s done! The vegetable gardens are protected now by our solar powered battery charged electric fence. So far, we’re winning against the deer & elk. We’ll keep our fingers crossed.

I decided that since Beasley was having a tough time getting up and down the stairs, what with her old age, I’d build her a ramp. As you can see by these pictures, the ramp won’t be worn out any day soon.

I often wonder what motivates people who are trying to sell something. They put an ad in the paper and fail to list the selling price. Are they lonely and want people to phone just to inquire about the price. Perhaps, they don’t know what to sell it for and are afraid to name a price wanting you to put it an offer, maybe it’ll be a really good offer. I’ll never know because I won’t call to find out what the price is.