The Hofbrauhaus

Guten Tag!

In just over a month, Michael will celebrate his 21st birthday. Tami and I offered to have a party for him here at the house. However, Michael decided he would rather celebrate at The Hofbrauhaus in Newport. I've heard The Hofbrauhaus (even though I've never been there) is your typical German beer hall. Long tables with benches, beer in mugs, sauerkraut, pretzels and bier cheese (and other traditional German dishes) as well as accordion and Polka music (think Festhaus at Kings Island).

Michael is looking forward to his first legal beverage, but has absolutely no interest in getting intoxicated. Many kids on their 21st birthday go out and get totally smashed. That's not what this party is all about. A lot of family members and friends are likely to attend. This is a simple celebration with good German food and a little bit of beer. Nobody will be getting schnockered (the proper German term is betrunken).

This will be a come one, come all event. Michael turns 21 on October 20, but we will not celebrate until Friday, October 24. We would love to have you join us.

Honestly, I can't imagine a better way to celebrate than Michael embracing his German heritage. His Grandpa Mick and great grandpa Meyer would have been proud.

Auf Wiedersehen!

Christmas Present

No, not THAT kind of Christmas present. This post is about the ghost of Christmas present from Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol".

This is Abby's senior year and she only has two more plays until she graduates. The winter play this year is "A Christmas Carol" and Abby is playing the ghost of Christmas present. It's one of the lead roles and she has a large number of lines. Her Junior Prom date is playing Ebenezer Scrooge. I am looking forward to seeing East Central High School's presentation of the Dickens classic.

The play is the first weekend of December (Friday night, Saturday night and Sunday afternoon). If you are interested in seeing the show, let me know. I know Abby would love to see you there.

Bah Humbug!

Arrrrrrr!

This pirate joke made me chuckle :-)

No-Nut!

We had a wonderful visit with our grandchildren tonight. Sveta was a pure joy as usual. Elliott has changed SO MUCH since we saw him a few weeks ago. One area where he is growing by leaps and bounds is in his speech. He is saying new words every time we see him. One of his favorite new words is "No-Nut" (Translation=Doughnut). During a recent breakfast he refused to eat what was being offered as he shook his head, "No". When asked what he wanted he plainly stated he wanted "No-nut". He was told there were no doughnuts and he began to whine/cry. The boy loves his "No-nuts" and makes his desire for them well known. The Morton family has a tradition of having doughnuts for breakfast every Friday morning. This means 6 out of every 7 mornings Elliott is going to be displeased with what he is being served for breakfast. Rest assured his momma will not be feeding him "No-Nuts" for breakfast every morning. But, hey, who doesn't like a good "No-Nut" in the morning?

Tami's recent sale

As mentioned yesterday, Tami's most recent sale went very, very well. She spent weeks preparing for it and setting it up. Friday and Saturday the merchandise went flying out the door. Tami and her clients were both happy with the results.

On another positive note, there is a quick turnaround until her next sale. The first weekend in October she will have another sale in Florence, Kentucky.

We've learned one very important thing through this business. Provide a quality product (i.e. operate things like you have a brain), provide good customer service (i.e. show people you care about them and their accumulated possessions) and you will get more business than you can handle. This is exactly what Tami is doing and the business keeps pouring in.

It will be interesting to see what happens this winter. It seems that estate sales would be a seasonal thing, but we'll have to wait and see. Maybe people will want to have sales in the cold weather. Either way, I'd expect things to at least slow down if not stop.

More Success

Tami completed yet another successful estate sale. I helped today and worked for 12 hours. I'm too exhausted to give a report tonight. More later.

Minimum Wage

When I was in high school, I worked as a fry cook at Long John Silver's. When I started the job I made minimum wage ($3.35/hr). After a year of sweating my rear end off I was deemed worthy of a raise. I was granted a full dime raise... $3.45/hour and I felt like I was making a lot of money. Keeping in mind I could fill my gas tank for about 10 bucks and a movie ticket was a only a couple of bucks, I was making decent money for the job I was doing. Working at LJS served as more than a source of income for a high school student. It served as a way of showing me that I needed to go to college if I wanted to make more than minimum wage in my life. Never during my time working a hot, grimy job did it occur to me to DEMAND more money. The job was offered to me at minimum wage. I knew I could take the job or leave it. There was never a promise for great increases in my income. In the end, I took the job and it brought in the money I needed at the time.

I bring up this topic because of the recent reports of fast food workers walking off the job in protest of the low minimum wage. These people claim they cannot make a living at a minimum wage job. In turn they are demanding salaries of more than $15/hr. My response to the claim of not being able to make a living on minimum wage is pretty simple. I say, "No kidding!". Minimum wage jobs are not intended to be full time jobs with which people support their families. Traditionally these jobs have been for students and for people looking to make some extra money. Working at McDonald's is not intended to be a career. If these burger flippers want a good job with a decent wage, they should apply themselves in school. If they are not college material (let's face it, not everybody is cut out for college) they should at least look into a trade school or vocational school. Instead many of these people mess around and sleep through school or completely drop out. If you party through school and put forth absolutely no effort, you shouldn't expect to get a well paying job when you suddenly decide minimum wage is not enough. This is not a snobbish attitude. It's a realistic one. If you want to make a healthy living, quit acting like a knucklehead, apply yourself in school and stop blaming other people for your lack of income. The government DOES NOT owe you a competitive salary. Get out there and EARN it.

If minimum wage goes up to a level that people say they need in order to make a living, I say get ready for automated fast food restaurants. Look below for the fast food employee of the future...

Please note this should read, "$15 AN hour".

Patriot Day

September 11th. We all know what happened and how it has changed our world forever. As a social studies teacher, I will try to explain the events of 13 years ago to children who weren't even born when it happened. I know we all remember the horrors like they happened yesterday, but for these children it will seem like it happened a million years ago.

We will never forget.

Tipping off the enemy

Tonight our President will go on national television and lay out the strategy for fighting ISIS. Am I the only who thinks Mr. Obama is telegraphing his punches? Why in the world should he broadcast ANYTHING about how we plan on knocking the terrorists on their keesters? Nothing like giving them a chance to prepare for our every move! There must be some great Generals rolling over in their graves. Can you imagine General Dwight D. Eisenhower going on TV and telling the Nazis he was planning on invading France at the beaches of Normandy. Or even the Japanese broadcasting their intentions to bomb Pearl Harbor. If these things had happened, the Nazis would have heavily fortified Utah Beach and the U.S. Navy would never have been caught flatfooted. The crew of the USS Arizona would have gotten up early and would have been at the ready to blast Japanese Zeros out of the sky. I don't care how vague the President is tonight... he shouldn't be telling anybody our military plans. Period.

I agree

Yes, I would totally agree. Imagine the possibilities!