September 30, 2009 - Day 3 the Final Day

September 30, 2009. The last day of the month. Just a shell awaits a new party to run the shop now. Today, the salon office gets dismantled which is at a different location. Then what? The owner and staff have jobs waiting for them elsewhere. Everyone is taking a two week break before carrying on to the new place. The end of a chapter. I spent part of my night pondering whether i should retire when i can and take the earliest out or to carry on, pay my coworkers to let me take extended vacations and still keep the employment. It is a tough call and i have a year to make the decision. I guess a lot will depend on where things go now that this business that dragged us down has ended. There is another business going on that is beauty related that is going very well and more time can be dedicated to that... It has got to be one of the top MLMs out there, a very desired product. I ponder hitting the road with my wife and building that business fulltime. Having some multiple streams of income is a great way to go! Once again you see life has many paths to choose from. Picking the right one is the hard part.
Stop the presses, a last minute buyer for the salon business is at the door... a possible miracle, finally!!! The guy liked it and now has to let his partner take a peak tomorrow.

September 29, 2009 - Day 2 of Final 3

It is too bad the manikin is staying... They use to have a problem with the retail some time ago. Some thief would open the door and grab a bottle of shampoo off the rack and high tail it away. When the manikin was placed by the entrance, that never happened again!

Well, just today and tomorrow and the game is over! Still some more work to do yet in cleaning up the shop. It is time for someone else to enjoy it. And it will remain a mixed bag of memories from now on.

As one door closes, other doors have been opening. It makes it easier to move on when you have something to move on to. It comes down to the word "change." Sometimes it is for the better and sometimes not. This time it will be! Other opportunities are out there as well, and some have yet to be discovered...

September 28, 2009 - Final 3 Days Begin!

The words beside the change room struck me. Yup, it was time for a change. Onto a new adventure and to leave the old chapter behind. It is not an easy one as there are many memories, both good and bad. A lot of hard work and putting time and energy into people only to see your efforts totally destroyed. Countless money lost. Another day of clearing out and cleaning up and then one final goodbye and onward! Maybe like saying goodbye to a bad marriage? You try hard to save it, but in the end, it bites you in the bum!

September 27, 2009 - Weekend to Oblivion

And now it is time to say goodbye. All that will remain are the photos of it's days. Shutting down something that just wasn't profitable to continue. I call it a debt monster also known as a money pit... Take, Take, Take...no give back anything!

I remember in 1995 starting an investment club with two other guys as we were learning to trade stocks. We had a 35% return the first year and then a mining giant company called Bre-X was found to be a fraud with a bogus find. Down crashed all mining stocks including ours. A good contact was made which helped more than make up for the small investment in the club which had to go through the shut down process. A friend at work was trying to get one started and wanted me onboard. After my experience with the first club, i knew some key things to watch for and told this fellow and his friend to be president. At the first meeting they wanted to spend all the club's money and go 100% against what i was saying. I knew that very day that this club would have to be shut down as it would not survive. I was right, a year later, guess who had the ugly task of closing the doors? I like profitable ventures and win win situations that follow proven plans.

September 26, 2009 - Weekend to Oblivion

It is over hopefully... not quite 5 years of the curse! The fat lady hasn't sung yet so i am still a little bit nervous on the real outcome. Half of a lifetime of wealth accumulated was lost in this venture! If i had a revolver for every bad person that i met through here, i would need two revolvers i jokingly will tell people. Now it is time to dismantle it. The doors close on September 30th and only a few days left hoping someone will come along and buy the business which has been up for sale for a long time now. Lots of lookers and some qualified buyers, but not one offer! I can retire in a year's time, travel fulltime or be stuck working til i drop dead. Some choice!

September 25, 2009 - Trip to South

Heading to the south end of the city today to meet with my accountant and to take my grandson out to lunch. It was a late night in getting to sleep and an early day as the sun came up and it was time to begin the day's journey. Very nice to spend a bit of time with this small tyke! Then came a 9 hr shift which completes another week of work and time for a hectic 3 day weekend coming right up. More changes on the way. More moving to do and reorganizing. The calm before the storm. My wife's business is closing it's doors after a near 5 yr. struggle with great financial casualties.

September 24, 2009 - Flight to Nowhere

Ever have one of those days where you just stay in one spot? You just cannot go anywhere. Life seems to leave you hanging and all you can do is wait. This is one of those days. Nothing planned for the day, but the usual work schedule. Maybe a time to try and get a few more things done on the websites. Taking some time now learning how to do different types of websites and have been looking for templates and software as well. It will be time to meet with the accountant on Friday and do the year end return for the real estate business. Plans have not gone the way i had hoped with so many delays as i look over the past year. As i look over the past 5 years, since i have not travelled like i usually do, things look pretty grim. I am still pondering packing it all in and then going on the road full time... Lots of lost time to make up is the way i look at it.... and i have a timeline of just over a year to make that decision.

September 23, 2009 - Travelling Alone or Not?

Do you travel alone or go with someone? Travelling alone means no compromising, you do things when you want to or feel like it. Full control and freedom. Travelling with someone is nice in that you can share the costs and the adventure with so long as you have good plans in place and know what each other's expectations are. There are countless stories of bad travel experiences out there. Some travel companions don't get moving til half the day is lost. Others expect the other to pay for everything. Some are control freaks and you had better do what they want when they want to and go to the type of restaraunt that they decide on. I remember on a trip to the east coast in 1999, coming across a scene of two racoons crossing the road in front of me. How i wished that i had someone with me to see that scene unfold. It happened so fast that i did not capture the photo either. I always thought when travelling, what if something were to happen. I could be helpless out there with no one to drive me to a hospital. And too, one has to remember that 99 out of 100 things you worry about never happen! Well, there are pluses and minuses as you can see.

September 22, 2009 - Hoboing Your Local Area

I had to run an errand today to the south end of the city. It dawned on me once more about having a local hobo adventure right here in the city where i live for starters. I have photographed many a scene around the city and there are still more areas to explore. I made that my mission over the next while to capture some of the city's autumn scenes as my project.
This seems to be a good starting point and get in some practice again of just being out there! Just thinking that maybe seeing if anyone in the Facebook camera club would like to go out on a hike around town to shoot some autumn shots. It might be fun to share the adventure!

September 21, 2009 - New Plans Begin!

The photo is of a garden railway next door to the Museum of Transportation in Wasilla, Alaska. I was doing some reminiscing and had added this as my Facebook profile photo.
My other half will be starting a new job with just two weeks vacation time off per year. I have 5 weeks and can get extra time by paying others cash to cover my shifts. We have different days off at work and management lets us do 30 cash/work trades which adds on to the time off. Well, my lovely wife says that i can take off on a two month roadtrip alone and carry on the hobo adventure! I am thinking of taking two one month trips. One to revisit the Oregon and California coastal hwy and perhaps swing back through Az and up to Pike's Peak and through Denver and then off to home. And the other trip, i would like to head east and south, maybe taking 5 weeks off. That gave me a spark of hope having been going nowhere for the last 5 years. In the meantime i found a budget program on the net and am in the process of putting it all together now. I have plenty of time to figure it all out.

September 20, 2009 - Keep Right, Sign Says Left???

A confusing sign? Try and follow those conflicting directions! Plans can be like that. You start in one direction and end up going in another. This is one of those weekends where that applies. I have some chores to do in the Crowsnest Pass area that are now postponed til next weekend. They have been postponed for a month now it seems or longer. One can only imagine how the grass has grown over that period of time! I might be cutting through a jungle when i do get there. Typically, the last of the summer months are very hot and the grass hardly grows at all as it is so thirsty for some water. The area is usually very dry during that time of year. Fire bans are in effect.
The time also has come to begin a new budget. A budget is like a starting point. If you can get a good one together that works, then you can move right along. If not, it becomes one of those things that gets postponed again and again.
I like to use what i call a "Task List." You write on a blank piece of paper all the things you want to get done that day. You can mark at the top, Monday to Sunday and note any things coming up in the near future such as bills to pay, errands to run, etc. That way everything gets done in the timeline that you have set. And what usually happens is that the day's events are postponed til the next day as you write over Monday and call it Tuesday.

September 19, 2009 - The Traveller's World

I was thinking last night about being in the traveller's world. It is a different mode all together. You leave behind the normal hussle and bussle and enter a new world, more laidback and then you find others out there in the same mode as yourself. You experience the freedom of the road. Once you have a taste for it, it sure is hard to live without it. You'll meet others at gas stations, attractions, roadside stops, rest areas, etc. I always found it enjoyable to hear where they are from, where there are headed and where they came from on their journey. I always like to learn of places and stops not to miss. Usually if you ask one of the locals, they can tell you great spots to see or restaraunts to visit since they know their own area best. I remember being in a Chinese restaraunt with 3 others. Some people were passing by slowly not sure about the place. The food and service was great so all 4 of us waved to them to come on in. We were not locals to the area, but lucked out on a good food stop.

September 18, 2009 - Time Travel

Time travel! Ever wondered what it would be like to go back into history and change some of those major events in your life? I probably have watched about every time travelling show and movie out there. I can think of many things that i would change having the 20 20 hindsight vision now! But then again, if a person were to go back and change what was, then the new path chosen might not have been much better either! Anything altered, especially when it would come to having kids, that probably would not exist and everyone having access to time travel, history would be nothing but a jumble of events constantly changing. Even if you were to go back in time but not be able to change anything, the knowledge that you could gain would certainly change the future. And what of future time travel.... Check those stock prices and then go back and make sure that you bought in at the right time. One would certainly be wealthy! Well, it is not possible. We live in the present. We change the events of our life here and now. The trick is to line things up as best as possible with what you are given to use. It is like hitting a moving target. Everything around us is in a state of constant change. What amazes me is watching buildings that are not that old being torn down and new ones going up just because someone wanted that certain location. Time. Onward we go! Happy Birthday Bro Phil! 51 today and onward too! I have a brother 3 yrs and 3 days apart. My lucky number is 3. The good part is that people think he is older than me! I like that!

September 17, 2009 - Reflections

While there are no long road trips in the near future going to happen, i take time to reflect on a time when the road trips happened one after the other... It was funny in that while on one trip, i was already planning the next. I would try and cut a few corners to make sure that the savings would be applied to the next trip. I had 4 weeks of vacation time and with my work, i could pay other drivers to work in my place. We have different days off which made it easy and flexible to do this. This was very helpful when i went to the Florida area in 2003 and the cross country trip in 2004. Along time ago in Winnipeg, i met a paramedic who was travelling across Canada. He did it for 10 years and had enough so what he did was to take a cooking course so that he could get a job anywhere. He moved to one city after another, worked, rented some short term furnished accomodations, saw all the sights in the area and then moved on. What a great idea! Then i was mentoring one of the new drivers and he had done basically the same thing with his family or this guy went from country to country chalking up having lived now in 18 of them! His tip was to try and work for a multinational company and they take care of the visas for you. Well, you can do whatever suits your fancy. I am always on the lookout for creative ideas. I thought the Rv lifestyle was good too. My problem is that i like a good shower and not wild about those fast sailor showers. One year to the early out retirement for me. Have been looking at the many options to try and line up the best ones. I will have to sell off some of the real estate and clear off the debts to go fulltime travelling. I already had a taste of the freedom, it really is hard to be landlocked now.

September 16, 2009 - Stuck on a Bridge

I had to crawl through a parking lot of cars. I inched my way across this bridge and noticed the traffic below. Not too far from where i sat was the open road. It just wasn't my turn to head out anywhere. Ever felt stuck in a rut? How do you get going again? Things will roll in due time. Always wondered why i kept going around in circles and then one day i noticed one of my feet nailed to the floor! I no sooner lost around 20 mins crawling along only to hit another delay. They were paving one side of the road and doubling with single lanes. In the bottleneck at an intersection to a mall, they were allowing left turns which really gummed up traffic... now 40 mins late... Some days go off to a slow start... but gets better as the day carries on! Just the way it is.

September 15, 2009 - Happy 54th Birthday!

The adventures continue passing a new milestone, age 54! Gazooks! Where did the time go? And what of the days to come? I like to sit back take a blank piece of paper and draw out a chart showing years going down and the months going across. Then you can plot events such as birthdays, milestones to occur and then you can see more of the roadmap ahead as to where you are going and to make the best choices possible. I can see more positive things happening over the next six months so long as they happen and there is no interference. Gone is the week of vacation now and the few extra days off. Back to work on the job again. 9 hours of touring the city! This is a daily hobo adventure when working. Here is a helpful quote that i recieved today for handling stressful situations... "Handle every stressful situation like a dog. If you can't eat it or play with it, Just pee on it and walk away!"

September 14, 2009 - Quick Trip to Stavely, Alberta

Now back at the temporary home base. Stalag 13! Apartment living is like being in a prison cell. Renting an apt suite when we have 7 properties??? What is wrong with that picture? Long story and to make it short, i won't tell. That is why i called this temporary. The mail still comes to the property that we did live in, but that is a 45 min drive south of the city. Does a person keep moving the mail around or leave it in a place that is inconvienent to retrieve? In a traveller's world, i studied the way of the fulltime Rver. It seemed that the majority still wanted a "home base." In most people, we still have a desire to have someplace to call home. That will be part of my story as time goes on since in my travels, i have come across many places that i would call home... Kissimmee, Fl, Black Hills of South Dakota, Portland, Oregon, to name a few. While i travelled, i had a vision of a group of like minded travellers investing in properties in many places. We would travel from one to the other as we went about our travels. What do you do with smokers versus non smokers? Who cleans up the place were just a few of the problems with doing that. Well, the Stavely place is up for sale to a real estate investor to finish. Perfect property for a business in the front while you live in the suite in the rear. Off to get the mail, pick up some stuff from there and return home. Sometimes life becomes a merry go round. This is one of those days!

September 13,2009 - Happy Birthday Karyn!

That number just jumped out at me. Karyn, my daughter lives in Vancouver, B.C. so we don't get to visit that often. Enjoying a sunny Sunday today. Met with Garth, the builder of the cabin at the lake. Still looking for a joint venture investor for $60,000 or two investors at $30,000 each or 6 at $10,000 each. You get the picture. I have the cabin going to the lock up stage before i ran out of funds. I would like to upgrade the windows and purchase the leased lot. That would make the cabin more desireable and probably still the cheapest kid on the block at the resort community as an entry level price. It is a 3 bedroom, 1200 sq ft home with a partial lake view, and backs onto a greenspace. I have 7 properties and rent a suite in an apartment. Go figure??? Trying to set up a new deal with potential jv partners to buy a house in Calgary, Ab. Always a pleasure to create some win win deals. Spending lots of time pondering how to line up the real estate ducks.

What is it with life that sometimes you get one deal after another drop on your lap and then at other times, life goes quiet?

September 12, 2009 - Return to Calgary, Alberta

The days at the resort are gone for this year. Now back to the city. There is much work to do between now and the end of the month. My wife is closing her business. that marks the end of close to 5 years of being in a constant losing battle with it. Maybe one step in the direction of hitting the road in a year's time? Every day is a step into the unknown in one way or another. I saw this on a church billboard as i passed it today... "I'm not afraid to die. I just do not want to be there when it happens!"

September 11, 2009 - Last Day at the Resort

September 11, the day the alleged terrorists attacks happened. I say alleged as i have done a search on Google for 911 with the word hoax and have watched a number of videos on youtube that really raises a lot of thoughts as to what really happened that day. As i remember that day in history and those fallen, i also remember a fellow traveller and photographer whose name is Sam McFarlane. I first contacted him via a Yahoo Group called car_living. He was living in his pick up truck at the time and taking some very interesting photos and placing them on his blog. I followed his adventures off and on since and then one day not too long ago, i decided to check up on him and see where and what he was up to. His website was gone. I thought uh oh, something is wrong. I did a Google search for him and through a few attempts, i learned that he was found at the bottom of a ravine in New Mexico. He died around age 26 or 27. That was a very sad day and this blog has created partly in memory of this wandering adventurer who was based mostly in New Mexico, although he had made one trip to New Orleans.

Today is the last day here at the timeshare resort. Weather is sunny and a bit on the cool side. The week has gone by quickly. Taking time to enjoy the last day while it lasts.

September 10, 2009 - Time to Regroup

Have you ever gone so far in your life, where you need to take some time out to regroup, make new plans and even consider totally new directions? A time of reassessment? This is a week of regrouping, relaxing and thinking about which way to channel the energy to make the best of the future. Sometimes trying to do that is like hitting a moving target. You head in a direction, always looking for an open door to present itself. The earliest out for retirement is around a year away. Trying to line up the ducks to be able to retire. But maybe if i stayed a wee bit longer? Life is full of choices and variables to consider in trying to design a masterplan. Constant ones like what to eat today are minor compared to the major decisions that affect your overall picture. Some decisions once made cannot be reversed. The pressure is on to get it right the first time. What better place to relax than Banff Gate Mountain Resort. I bought into this back in the early 90's and now almost 20 yrs have past by. The deck offers a sweeping view of the mountains. Very peaceful. There usually is a herd of deer wandering about the resort. No deer means that there are bears nearby and that was confirmed by the resort saying that if anyone wants to do any hiking to drop by and pick up some bear spray just in case. Two more nights and then off to home again.

September 9, 2009 - A New Chapter Begins...

All major travels had ceased in 2004 after the Cross Country Roadtrip. Two businesses were created and the adventures headed into a different area til September, 2009. Life is about change. Everything around is always changing. We have to go with the flow as well a day at a time or moment by moment. This week has been spent at the timeshare resort pondering the future and regrouping over the events of the past 5 years. I am told that 5 is the number of change. And to top it off, today, i was hearing about the number 9 and it is the 9th day of the 9th month of the 2009th year and almost 9 pm as i edit this first posting. I can see that in looking back over the major events that have taken place. My brother had pointed out that things that happen with the family happen in the month of April or September. The travels now are local with many photos of the local area.