What A Day — Challenging — But My Brain Is Fried — Real Life Rears It’s Ugly Head

I should have titled this post — A Day In The Life. But it wasn’t actually. It was somewhat typical, but overall atypical. There’s no real estate investment wisdom here. There’s real life, which is, as we all know, unpredictable, funny, draining, irritating, and sometimes heartbreaking. Take a shot — read what happened today — thanks.

I was starting the day with favorite son Josh by having breakfast at one of our all-time favorite local spots, DZ Akin’s. If you’re lookin’ to have some of the best deli food since New York became a city, DZ’s is the place to go. Their breakfast menu is only exceeded, by just a few miles in size, by their lunch & dinner menu. How big is it, you ask? My favorite comment on the lunch side is, roughly paraphrased, “The first 59 sandwiches come with……..” The first 59? (They actually have 102 — for the record.) Sorry for the side trip there. We’re waiting to get our order when, as we’re talking about what’s on our collective plates, it dawns on us what the heck is actually on our plates.

We had a brainstorming session planned with a local mortgage guy. (Sorry, can’t name him — agreements and all.) We’re setting up a new site, and needed to address all the normal stuff. You know, name, content, customer profile, web design, blah blah blah. That session took over three hours. After experiencing a brainstorm of that duration, I don’t know about you, but I was more than somewhat depleted.

This meant lunch didn’t come until almost 2 O’clock. Never a good thing. Fortunately we’re the down and dirty eat-at-your-desk types these days. We have two fridges, a microwave, two ways to make coffee, and a stainless steel kitchen sink. So with at least mediocre planning we can enjoy fairly cool lunches without venturing out. Trophy wife Diane has been a great sport by cooking us five star cuisine every night, so all we have to do is ‘wave it and we’re good to go. We ate. We actually vanquished lunch. Clearly more accurate.

Before I was totally finished, my 2 O’clock conference call was yelling for me to answer the phone. Geez. The cool thing was, the caller is already one of my favorite new people. She’s a New Yorker through and through, and is becoming, by way of these talks, comfortable with the Brown & Brown model. After talking about the NY market, and how, to quote her, “Everything there is insanely expensive, including the outrageous cost of living.” But, for the foreseeable future, they’ll stay in Brooklyn. They really like the lifestyle, even though with a six figure income they still budget. She’s curious, asks great questions, and is smart and a half. I called her tough, and she thought I’d meant she was being tough on me. Not so. I’d meant she and her husband are way tough as a result of successfully surviving the NY style of living while figuring out how to actually save money. I can’t wait to start working with them. I’ve spoken to both of them, but mostly with her. She’s fun.

Now it’s just past 3:30 and I’ve gotta return a call to my web/blog geek. He’s doing our new site, and had a couple questions. Took care of it in five minutes or so. Cool.

My brain is fading — big time. Complex thoughts are now beginning to look like Mt. Everest.

It’s now 4, and Josh has to leave for a critically important early workout. He’s got a softball game in one of the (I think) three leagues he’s in. See ya Big Guy, don’t let the door hit your butt on the way out.

Next on the phone list is a six foot female brain-teaser who masquerades as my — what should I call her? Well first, she’s now a friend. She’s also maybe the smartest person I currently know first hand. I think I’m a fairly bright guy, but seriously, my brain probably couldn’t kick-start hers in a pinch. She’s actually my Business Manager/Marketing Boss of All That Is BawldGuy And Josh. So to review, my brain is now the consistency of overcooked brussels sprouts. And I now, for my benefit, need to have a decently intelligent conversation about subjects for which I’m hopelessly over-matched, (with most folks, that is) and having it with the perennial smartest kid in class. I’m not exaggerating about her. She’s the real deal.

I muddle threw the conversation, but she really forces me to reach back for that little extra. (Yeah, like that’s a new experience with her.) She let’s me know I’ve said something she likes, and I’m like a puppy who has finally figured out what the doggy door is for. Trust me, without her, I’m a sail without a boat. She’s that good. She ends up giving me some incredible advice on the new site, but dispenses these golden tidbits like they were almost throw-away lines. Imagine getting pitching tips from Sandy Koufax and you’ll understand how jazzed Josh and I are to be getting business and marketing advice from her. And she’s cool to boot.

Liz is truly one of a kind.

I think, for about a nanosecond, that I’d take the time to write my post for today. After a conversation this morning with one of my two world class CPA types, Lenny, I’ve got post material for a couple days, maybe more. Alas, my brain declares there’s no time for a Bawldy’s post. That ship has sailed. I login to my site, then close the laptop. Who am I fooling? Heading for the parking lot, ready for home, I figure to save some time and call my Numero Uno in Boise, and get an update on the latest builder project. He he and the builder talked, my guy has a good feeling, and the builder is now off generating numbers for us. We’ll see. Light traffic on the freeway home, so there’s no delay — except I need to park outside my place, as the garage will absolutely cut off this conversation without mercy. It fits the day.

I walk in the front door and no wife. She’s leaving for a business trip to Florida tomorrow morning, and will be gone 4-5 days. I call her, and she tells me the grocery shopping is next, along with other errands, mostly for my benefit. I think I’ll forgo any whining at this point. (I’m not totally brainless yet. ) I don’t like it when we’re not in the same zip code overnight, much less several days. She has her own business though, and works exceptionally hard at it. So — no whining.

But it’s at that point I remember Liz had referred a specialist for me to talk with about a newsletter I’m contemplating. Nice job Jeff. First this nice lady emails me and is ignored because of the brainstorming swirling through the office. Then she calls, thinking maybe her email had been labeled as spam, instead of ignored. Yikes. I then explained my need to talk later. She is ever the understanding pro, and says no problem. As I write this, it dawns on me I’ve totally forgotten to call her back. Since she’s in Connecticut it’s coming up on 11 there — the night time 11. So I stopped writing and sent her a quick email asking, with hat in hand, if we could talk tomorrow morning. I’m awaiting her reply. She sounded on the phone like really cool lady. I wonder if Sock Puppet knows her? Doesn’t everyone in Connecticut know everyone else? Heck, you can drive from one end of the state to the other in less time than it takes to do the same in San Diego county.

Now it’s about 8:15 PM PST and I’ve not had dinner, seen my wife, or finished writing yet. My fried brain has now reached critical mass and is showing signs of turning off everything but the ability to make a two minute dinner, and watch the Padres beat the Rockies. I’m smiling though, because just before beginning to write this classic piece of timeless literature, I treated myself to a post by Kris Berg, an incredibly gifted, and almost always funny local real estate blogger. Seems she’s been having a tough time the last month or so. Nothing earth shattering, mostly what appears to be Murphy camping out on her doorstep. After reading her post, I don’t feel nearly as tired. I’d rather of had my day, as no fires had to be put out, and everything client-wise went as planned. Heck, I even got a call from an Idaho client just to tell me how much they appreciated our help. His investment had recently closed. I could spend all day every day on those kind of calls. Of course, it’s what we do every day that makes those calls possible. I leave the call reinvigorated — at least for a couple minutes.

My brain is still done for the day. Thanks for listening. I’ll be back for tomorrow — which is kind of a special day of sorts.

And Kris, thanks for the inspiration.

Oops! My wife calls and says she’d sure appreciate some help with the Vons booty. My pleasure honey. (It’s something my brain is still qualified to do at this point.)

Now she’s not nearly as talkative as some of my friends and family’s wives, but when she’s on a roll, she’s a good as any. I see right away she has something somewhat uncool on her mind. But, she has to get to it by taking the scenic route. I immediately shift into attentive hubby mode. Her face starts to cloud a bit. I don’t get it — she’s talking about some office/storage space near her current place that’s just opened up — and she’s been looking for a bigger space forever it seems. That’s a good thing, right? Well, yeah, but recall the scenic route.

For several years now she and the owner of the business (they cut marble) housed in the aforementioned site, would see each other very early on two or three Saturday mornings a week. Sometimes they’d see each other in the afternoon of a weekday for a minute of “Hi, what’s shakin’?” — then back to work. He worked all the time. One of his many, many machines cost him almost a quarter million bucks. He’d been breaking his back building his business for a very long time.

This morning my wife sees a sign offering the guy’s space for rent. She calls the number and reaches the landlord. He tells her that her friend, the very nice man she’d been chatting with a few days a week for years — had been watching one of his kids, a daughter, play basketball a couple weeks ago. He abruptly keeled over, and died. Just like that — no warning — nothing. Dead. He was 41 years old. Geez.

His widow is 36 with two or three kids, and (we think) all their net worth invested into the business — in which nobody has shown a bit of interest in buying, at least as of today. They’re getting ready to move all the equipment so they can rent out the now unused space. My wife thinks, based upon their many Saturday morning conversations, that they owned their own home. Of course, there’s no way to know for sure. He was a workaholic, dedicated to his business and his family. He seemed to spend his money reinvesting in his business. You don’t buy a quarter million dollar machine on a whim.

My wife says he was a very good man — always talking about his wife and kids.

I don’t have anything to complain about. Everything is just fine, and the Lord has blessed me and mine. Before sleeping tonight I’ll pray for this very good man’s wife and children.

When you think of this now widowed 36 year old mother of young children, say a prayer for her too, would you please? Thanks.

Related posts:

1. Cost Segregation — Part II — An Example In Real Life
2. Real Estate Investing — Life BEFORE Retirement
3. Case Study: A Real Life Phoenix — Flying Higher Than Ever
4. Like It Or Not — Life Is A Meritocracy
5. Dealing With Reality — Life On The Road