Amos

This Sunday will be the 1st birthday of Amos Michael Long. 1 already. Kinda hard to believe that time had gone by so quick. Almost 1 year ago we picked him up and made him ours. He has grown so much and is now really walking, babbling all the time, eating table food like a champ, and becoming his own little person! Here are a few pictures of the year:

This is the first pic we got of him from the hospital

Mother's Day

Eating:

When we went to Dallas to finalize the adoption and he was officially ours!

Super Amos at Halloween

Christmas

I could go on with lots more, but I think you get the idea. He is one special guy in our house! Looking forward to many years to come with him in my life. I couldn't imagine what life would be like without him. No matter how bad things seem to be, it always make it better to drive in from work and be greeted at the front door by a 2 toothed smile!

Decisions to be made

Well, the time has come to make the tough decisions about a few things. The first is the restaurant. I am STILL waiting on the bids, but have just got off the phone with one of the contractors and he should be wrapping it up with the last few bits of info I just gave him. On that note a reality check has been taking place with me, Jenn, and this whole project. What started it all is a very unhappy me, mostly because of my dead end job. Last week a few things happened at work between me and my boss and it was all i could do to not walk out with my hand in the air and a few choice words shouted over my shoulder. I did not, but the last little bit of respect I had for him and the place I work. Jenn is feeling the same way with her position. Back to the restaurant, I know that this project is going to cost upwards of $250K to get going. Like I said before, I don't have that kind of money or the collateral to go to the bank for a loan. All of the potential investors we have approached have not responded in a way that would lead one to believe that they are interested in handing over any of their hard earned money to someone they really don't know that well. I really don't have the reputation in town either to warrant anyone to come and say, "Yes we would love to fund your restaurant." So, that leaves us here, still with no money to get this going no matter what the cost is going to be. I am pretty sure that I am getting the picture that this might not be the time or place to make this happen. I know that it is a great concept and that it would go over here, but all the moral support we have received from all the people we have been talking just won't pay the bills or get us the loan. Needless to say I am still not going to quit until I at least get 1 of the quotes back. After that I think it will be time to wrap it up. I am quite bummed to say the least. Up until about a week ago I just was really sure that this thing was going to happen some how, some way. I had all these ideas about how it was going to happen and that our idea was what this town needed and someone would realize that and come our way with $$. Hey, who said I couldn't dream?

Now we have to make some even tougher decisions. Does this town hold anything else for us? What next? How much longer can I survive at my job? Do I even want to stay in the restaurant business? If we were to move, where? Jenn really, really wants to practice massage. How can we do that and where? We really need insurance. Where can we get work that will offer decent coverage? This time is so much more complicated. In the past if we had been in this spot, we would have given our 2 weeks notice, packed it up and moved to the next great location. Now we have 1 more to consider and a house to sell. We know that we just can't do it like we have in the past. We need to have at least one job before we go anywhere so that we don't get behind and have to play catch up again.

We started job searching this week to see what options we have available. We are looking all over the place, not just here. A chef friend here has been wanting to talk to me about the possibility of me working for him/ with him to really get his place going full steam. I am open to conversations. It would not solve Jenn's desire to practice massage or the insurance delima. I told him I am not a line cook and that is not what I want to do. I need more on a daily basis. I like to interact with people and deal with food. That is a big reason I wanted to open my own place, so that I could do it all. We have talked to some friends of ours that really would like us to come out to see where they live. It has a lot of restaurant and massage opportunities. It is somewhere neither of us has ever been. We are interested and are thinking about making a quick trip out that way to check things out. Right now I am just trying to move on and start thinking about the next step.
One day at a time.

Lots of good things......

Been a while since I last posted. Since then we have been quite busy and it seems hard to believe that it is now March. Amos has up and started walking. Took his first few steps the first part of Feb and is now running, sorta, all over the place. He came down with a double ear infection and I got the mild case of the flu this week. Lot of laying around and sleeping for both of us. Went to a funeral last week and was once again reminded life is too short sit around at a crappy job and feeling sorry for yourself. My lovely wife sent me a nice quote -

"Take your needle, my child,and work at your pattern — it will come out a rose by and by. Life is like that . . . one stitch at a time, taken patiently." — Oliver Wendell Holmes

Back to patience, again. Although we got the restaurant plans over to a food service designer and he was able to get them fixed. One of the bids on the build out of the space should almost be finished and the other right behind. I am thinking that in the next few weeks we are going to know one way or the other if this is going to happen. I have been talking to more people and trying to get this idea in front of as many people that I can. We have nothing to lose and we need to get the word out, this is a great idea for this town and it would be good to get some more of these going here. Too much chain food, not near enough local eats. If this town continues to attract people who are 1)retiring 2) students at Angelo State University (student population of 6,000 with plans to grow to 10,000 3) military personell and Goodfellow AFB and 4) middle aged adults who are sick of the big city life then our concept is going to be what these people are looking for. It just frustrating that if you don't have money then how are you supposed to get something like this going? In a few weeks we will find out, I just have a feeling and then we can finally take the next step. Out of here is a possibility, but where is a mystery.