Little Sahara, Oklahoma

Well, our annual dune trip was this past Saturday through Wednessday. Once again, this year was a blast. Just 4 of of went, but it is the same 4 that are always there with whoever else shows up. Little Sahara is a Oklahoma State Park, just south of Waynoka Oklahoma. It's a long ways to go, but it was worth it. We rented a house for the 5 days and there is a sand trail to the dunes from our house that is open 24 hours a day. Also the towns only business, or commerce, I guess comes from people who travel there to ride in the dunes, so you can ride anywhere in town that you want to on your 4-wheeler. The store, the market, the BAR, what ever. Anyway, Brian, Cody, Todd and I were there to ride 24/7 and we almost did, when we weren't doing other things. There are a few pictures below. Hope everyone is well.

Jim

All the reasons why

OK, here we go on this crappy blog. You want to know why I haven't been blogging, well I'm finally gonna tell you.

We went on vacation June 24th and came home on July 4th. July 1st, one of the guys that works for me, totalled my truck. My beautiful dodge. He was OK, but almost killed the passenger of the car he hit, when the other car ran a stop sign. I wanted to come home from vacation immediately. That was also the first time on vacation that I didn't take my phone to bed with me. So, I woke up to 13 missed calls.

Got home, everything was OK, but the lady was still in the hospital. Went back to work on July 5th. I went to see my biggest customer and was told that I had lost all of my glycol sales over 500 gallons. This was a blow, but not a big one, because these sales are what, when added to my regular sales, allow me to set new sales records for Dynochem, not where I actually make most of my sales.

July 7th, I lost the rest of my glycol sales to this customer, which IS where I make most of my sales and by that I mean most of my commission money. This was about 60-65% of my monthly sales. So, you can see the ramifications on my paycheck, and my head.

July 9th-10th. On the night of the 9th, late, I had to take Angie to the hospital in Denton for stomach pains. They kept her for 3 days, and treated her for Pelvic Inflamitory Disease, which she would have gotten from sleeping from someone other than me, or by me getting it by sleeping with someone other than her and then giving it to her. But they didn't tell us that at the time, so we accepted it without question. Oh, by the way, July 10th was out 13th wedding anniversary. I left her the first night in the hospital by saying, "Happy Anniversary, I Love You."

July 12th, I lost all of the rest of my business with my biggest customer, which added up to about another 10-15% of my business and commission. So I had lost about 70-85% of my total sales per month. And, I took care of these guys like they were my little sister. They wanted for nothing, lunches, service, someone to talk to, going to their weddings, all that shit.

I can't remember exact dates after this, but who cares at this point, I sure as hell didn't.

Next, I had to rush Angie back to the hospital to have her appendix removed. This was the cause of all of her problems. No, not sleeping around on either of our parts. That is something that we don't do to each other. I love my wife and she loves me, she showed me her boobies, and I love them too. Sorry, that was a cheap Waterboy reference to lighten the mood.

After that, my boss called me and my two guys to a meeting in Cisco to tell us that our company had been sold. This may not have been a big thing overall if I hadn't just gone from selling about $100,000 per month to about $25-30,000 per month. That's not enough to support 3 people and overhead and expenses and everything else that goes along with running a business. I knew that, but they didn't, and it sucked to have to keep that from them.

That was early August, and since then I have been looking for a new job. I have one and they don't. I feel horrible, but what could I do? I will have a spot for one of them soon, but not right away. Today is my last day in my old job and Monday I start with the new company. I will be taking all of my current customers with me with the exception of one.

I just found this out this week.

So there, now you know. This has been eating me up for 3 damn months, but now it is over. Blue skies and sunshine from here on out, right?

I hope so.

Tommorrow, I will tell you about my dune trip that lasted from Saturday til Tuesday with my boys. It's a much better story, I promise.

J

Matthew's name being called!

Now, normally when Matt's name is called, it isn't positive, but this time it was. You all know that Matthew is playing football this year, and we are all very proud. He does not play a position on offense that will ever get his name called, because he plays on the offensive line, but on defense, he plays linebacker and saftey. I have signed up to run the chains at ALL of his games, even though they only asked us to sign up once. But, I can't sit in the stands. I'm not a parent, I'm a coach and I don't care to hear what parents usually have to say. It is very rarely positive and you have a bunch of would/could have beens talking. Not my thing. I run the chains to be as close as possible to the action and I don't have to hear all the shit-talk of the idiots in the stands. First off, these are 3rd and 4th graders. They shouldn't even be playing tackle football in front of fans (parents). They are coached, thereby limiting them to a certain position at a very young age. The reason he hasn't been pushed to play at all, and never will be. Secondly, you have kids that don't want to play, but fathers who were not so good see their buddy's kid playing and think, "Man, I was as good as him, or better, when I was in highschool", so the kid plays and hates it. These same kids have the potential to be outstanding and are now locked into whatever position they get put into by a coach who is not qualified and has a very biased opinion may not even play by the time they reach highschool. The coaches on Matt's team have all of their children playing all of the skill positions on offense, even though Matthew catches the ball better than any one of them, yet he is not even the third team reciever. I brought it up, but it fell on deaf ears.

Matt has progressed much faster than I thought he would though. On defense, I predict he will be a starter by the end of the year. He has gotten aggressive, and really likes to "hit someone" as he says. As long as you can follow the ball at this age, you don't need much else. You just have to get there, and we have worked on angles and form. He's tough, no doubt about that, but he's smart too, so the things I tell him really sink in, just like Nat in softball.

Last game, he didn't play a whole lot, but his team kept the ball on offense for most of the game, and I don't care if he plays offensive tackle or not. But on defense, he made a touchdown saving tackle from the free saftey position and got his name called on the PA system by the announcer. WOW, he heard it and was pumped. Usually at this age, the saftey doesn't get a mention, because you start so far back from the action, but when you make a tackle of the opposing team's running back, all by your self, you get a mention. He did good, and I am very proud of him and his team. This team did not score a touchdown last year, and last game they scored two touchdowns. They won 14-0, in a large part due to Matt's TD saving tackle, he preserved the shutout, and everybody on the team got stickers for their helmets for it.

If anyone has a chance, grandparents take note. You should come see him play, he might surprise you, and the games are fun. I will list all of his remaining games below, just remember, I will be in the blue Nike shirt on the other side of the field running the chains, not sitting with you, but you still have a place to stay and we can talk after the game.

Jim

September 30th at noon
October 7th Open date
October 14th at 10 am
October 21st at 2 pm
October 28th at 11 am]

All games are in Alvord Texas, just take the 1655 exit, go east to the first paved street, turn north to the school, and the football field is behind it. $3 for adults and $2 for children to get in, but we will gladly pay your entry, just let us know.

Tommorrow, I will let you all know about why I haven't been blogging.

Again,

Jim