Young Nate Ate Dog Treats, 83 Years Young, Mafia Madness, Getting a Tattoo

“You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit.”
― Oscar Wilde

Hello there, good to see you Tuesday; Monday was here yesterday, she said to tell you hi.  I like your tunic. Did you get that at the Dollar Store?  I’m kidding; it’s nice, just trying to mess with you a little on this chilly morning.  Come on in; coffee is made, we made it with Liquid Death Water, Death Wish coffee, so it’s extra special.

We had a couple of chats with our team members, asking what we can do better and improve our culture, sharing the vision of where we are going next year.  We are doing this with our team to give us feedback and input on how to improve constantly.

I ran a call with a stranger; Kirby had reached out after I wrote about our thought leader’s call, and I wanted to learn more about him and share the basis of the group.  Kirby lives around Nashville and is a successful business owner, I knew some folks in his industry, and we talked about life.  Kirby will be joining our group, and I can’t wait for his input on our weekly leaders’ call. The universe has a way of connecting good people no matter their geographic location.  Welcome to our world, Kirby!

My wife stayed in the office, and Cousin and I headed to get a shirt and tie for him, and I needed some cuff links for my shit, my only set of cuff links are in Colorado; handy, I know.  I didn’t realize how much cuff links cost, but let me tell you, people are proud of their cuff links. So I got some fun socks, and Cousin struck out; they did not have his size shirt.  One interesting thing, he did find a tie, but that tie had to be ordered; you couldn’t take the item.  What kind of nonsense is that? 

We walked down to Sak’s, and it was closed.  Weird, closing on a Monday, supply chain issues, or labor shortage, your guess is as good as ours. However, since the wedding is Saturday, we needed to find him a shirt, so after a quick lunch, we headed to Men’s Warehouse and scored the items required for the event.  We left there and headed up to Beautiful Parker City.

We visited with my mother and father; Mom shared a new book she was reading; Dad has been running auto parts for his friend; I think they are busier today than at any other time of their life.  Both are 83 years old young. We left there, and I was asked to get a big boy haircut for the wedding; Cousin and I headed to Reflections in BPC.  My friend of 40 plus years and local celebrity Melissa got my wig wedding-ready, Cousin got his wig adjusted.

While in the chair, an old friend stopped by; I had not seen her in a few years; when you grow up in a town of 1300 people, you tend to know everyone.  “Lisa” shared a story of her father building a company locally, selling it, moving to Colorado, and starting a similar company out west.  The story sounded familiar, but in their case, the Mafia tried to kill one of their family members and burned down their business.  It sounded like a movie, but in the end, her father was able to rebuild his business and successfully retired after selling his revamped business. 

We headed back to Indianapolis, and our friend Young Nate was over; he had some appointments by our house, we had not seen him for a while; it was good to catch up.  This past weekend we went to a dog bakery goods shop and bought PVHT some cookies.  They were on the counter, and I noticed Young Nate opening the bag, and I said, “those are dog treats,” and he looked at me and said, “I had two; they are not bad.”

My wife went to bed early, as did cousin, Young Nate and I hung out a bit before I retired snuggling with my wife and navigating around our sleeping dog.  I got 9 hours of excellent sleep, woke up, and drank some Liquid Death before making coffee.  I now start my day with a nice cold can of water from the Alps; it reminds me of home.

I’ve got some work to do this morning, more teammate chats today, I’m starting to recruit for our company.  I’m going to build a bench of talented folks from all over the country, and as we grow, I’ll have a group of like-minded people who want to join our firm. So if you are a commercial insurance support person, send me a message; I would love to chat and see if you might be an excellent future team member.  We continue to build something cool; if you want to be a part of the Rolling Stones of the Insurance Industry, now is the time to make your move.

We are hosting Thanksgiving with our parents; I think we will have ten or so here; I asked Dr. Tony, and he said it’s probably not safe to have more than two people in our home without masks, but I think we are going to roll the dice collectively.  The menu is set; we ordered some ribs from a local joint, the best ribs in the nation.  My wife is making creamed corn with some locally grown maize.  Polish mistakes, a large salad, and a spinach dish will be our offering while my father brings his world-famous cheesecake.

I think we will take Friday off and hang with family; many are flying in for the wedding, we will have a gaggle of family in for a few days; it will be a celebration.   I’m so happy for our daughter and her future husband, three kids, now all married to beautiful mates, my work here is done, it’s time to find another mountain.  I shared with my cousin I might try stand-up comedy again.  I understand I will have to bomb for ten years before I can craft my message, but I’ve got the skills; I think it would be fun to have an unpaid side hustle making people laugh.

I’ve decided to get my first tattoo; it will be on my right wrist and be the letters RFN. RFN is a new movement and is all about living right fucking now.  The idea and concept come from my friend Matt who was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, but with a new treatment beat that little bugger.  He decided he would no longer put things off during his journey; now was the time to live RFN.  The tattoo will allow me to share his message, and I will help him with this new movement.  My other friend Matt got the tattoo on his left wrist, and I had to remind him it’s not LFN. It’s RFN!

“You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit.”
― Oscar Wilde