Ronczy, or Ronczys Where have you been?

I'd like to say we've been to London to visit the Queen, but no.

JRs Mom and Dad have needed several visits from us to help get them over hospital stays, reorganization of apartments and just general health and wellness issues. They are both doing well, considering.

We had a wonderful vacation with Tom, Mary and our nephew Scott. A whole week at Rocky Mountain National Park at the YMCA of the Rockies. It was great. JR and Tom got a big hike in, Aileen and Brian came and hiked with us one day, and the weather as a whole was pretty terrific. We played A TON of miniature golf and had a general blast.

Other changes have included me leaving Centro and opening my own company - G2 Solutions Company - where I will be offering Project Management services to small business and Event/Errand Planning for Residential Clients. It's going well so far and I hope to make it even better soon. Stay tuned!

JR is doing well and as you can imagine, with the downturn in economy, business is a little light right now. Things should shake out and be fine in the near future.

Kat came and visited us in August and we had a lot of fun. She came up with her friend Chad and we enjoyed a week together.

We celebrated JRs birthday in Chicago along with our Nephew Scott. It was nice to be there and see the folks and not be in the middle of an emergency or in charge of something.

Right now, the focus will be on starting the business and spending time together celebrating our life and our family and friends.

We hope to blog more now that we are not so crazy!

Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

When I saw this on Anne's blog, I had to try it. I am amazed by the ones it thinks I look like. I'm flattered by the Rita Hayworth, not so much by the Liza Minelli which I didn't include here.

Day 3 or What happens in Vegas....

Day 3 was also sunny and beautiful. The nice thing about this time of year in Vegas is it's not too hot, but also not horribly windy or cold or rainy. This day is also Anne's birthday so we had all kinds of fun things planned. We starte out by going to Hart and Huntington (where Inked is filmed) and Anne and I got tattoos. Mine is of a plant called a Wandering Jew and played a significant roll in my life. As you can see, it's on my ankle and very colorful. I love it. The tattoo artist was fun and had a great bedside manner and since it only took about 1.25 hours, it was not very uncomfortable. Anne stayed with me while they colored on me and helped the time pass. Aileen, Susan and Angela did some gambling and eating while they kindly waited for us.

We then went to Excalibur to pick up our tickets for Thunder from Down Under, the show we went to that evening. We wandered over to the Luxor which is shaped like, you go it, a pyramid. I've included an interior shot, but I couldn't capture the truly interesting architecture. There are no elevators, they are inclinators, as they mirror the angle of the pyramid.

The Luxor has exhibits, and we'll term that loosely, of King Tut and a really baaaaaaad motion sensory ride. I also think after being at the Hilton and doing the Star Trek rides, nothing else can match.

We then went back to the hotel to clean up - which I must say we do quite well - to go to Olive's at the Bellagio for Dinner. I can't say enough about Chef Todd English. His food is quite stellar. We celebrated Anne's birthday in style. They brought Anne a beautiful dessert - see her blog for pics - and ate enough to be full, but not stuffed; very yummy indeed.

Then, the finale - Thunder from Down Under. Yep, that's all I'm saying. Go to their website and use the skill you've got to come up with some peppered story; it's better than anything we could tell you ;)

Susan and Angela went back to the hotel and Anne and Aileen and I went to check out some clubs. We had a great time.

When we got back, we found Angela tending to a sick Susan - we feel so bad Susan that your trip ended with feeling so ill! Angela, Anne, Aileen and I stayed up until aroun 1am sitting on the floor chatting.

Vegas - Day 2

I've gotten a lot of request to see the spreadsheet I put together. I think some of my friends want to see just how AR I really am. So, to appease them:

The Day dawned bright and crisp and we took the shuttle over to MGM Grand and toured the casino and entered the street level and walked down to the M&M store - 4 stories of yummy goodness. We all had a great time looking at all the candy, faux movie posters and trivia. We even did the "tour" of how an M&M gets it's candy coating. I'd tell you how, but what happens in Vegas....We also watched a 3D movie which was hokey but fitting.

We walked our way down the strip taking in all the sights and sounds that are inherently Vegas. There is an enormous amount of construction and I took some grief about taking pictures of tower cranes.

We stopped and ate ice cream, which perked us all up and continued our walk to the Venetian so we could go through Madame Toussands Wax Museum which was thoroughly enjoyable. The recreations are amazing. Each room has its own theme. Everyone seemed to enjoy a different room for different reasons. Aileen and I found the sports room and reveled in one of our favorite football legend. One day, I hope to see Brett Favre "enshrined" in the wax museum. Aileen and I were dumbfounded when the young person in front of us didn't know who the wax figure below was. If you have to ask too, your friendship application will have to be reconsidered :)

We wandered into the Venetian and looked at the shops, listened to a gondolier sing and found a food court and regrouped. After a brief respite, we crossed the street to the Mirage and went to one of my favorite places, The Magic Garden. Zigfried and Roy performed at the Mirage for years and made this dolphin habitat and small habitat with tigers and lions and other animals. It's a nice oasis that is so antithetical to the controlled chaos which is vegas. Below is a picture of the dolphin habitat.

We took a cab back to the hotel, cleaned up and went to dinner at the buffet at the Rio where the food choices on the buffet were almost overwhelming. We left the buffet and went into the theatre to watch Penn&Teller which I would highly recommend. It was the perfect blend of up-close, illusion and physical comedy. I won't describe the show other than to say it was amazing. I'm a big magic fan and always appreciate a good illusion.

Day 2 ended with appreciative chatter about the day and anticipation of Day 3.

Want Less Junk in Your Trunk?

GreenDimes is a way to stop junk mail from appearing - similar to the no call registry

Our Friend Jack does the MS150

Our friend Jack from Houston has been one of our dearest friends for a very long time. JR and I miss his smiling face often. When I heard a few months ago that he was going to take the plunge and ride the MS150, I was at first surprised, then nervous and then so happy I could bust. The MS150 is a bike endurance ride. There are several throughout the country, but this one is in Texas. if you go to http://www,ms150.org/ms150 it should take you to the Houston-Austin ride. His times are below in reverse order.

Finish 4/13/2008 5:32:12 PM
Bastrop 4/13/2008 1:06:07 PM
LaGrange
4/12/2008 8:04:29 PM
Bellville 4/12/2008 10:56:39 AM

JR and I are so proud of Jack for doing this as this is no small feat and we wanted to brag about him publicly - in a private kind of way.

Congrats Jack

2008 GNI - Vegas Opening Day

March 27 - The day dawned bright and beautiful - eventually - as it was still dark at 4am when JR and I picked up Anne and Aileen to go to the airport. JR had a flight to Chicago at 6am which was only 20 mins before our flight, so we decided to all go together. JR would meet up with Anne and Aileen on Sunday and take them home while I stayed an extra day to hang out with Angela. Anne, Aileen and I must have picked the "starter" TSA line as it seemed to take an iterminable amount of time to go through the puffer. We emerged on the other side unscathed and found our gate. The plane was full of vibrant lively people considering the hour and our flight was pleasant. I had plenty of free drink tickets, but it took us a while to decide we wanted a drink. Anne was sitting nearest the window, Aileen in the middle and I took the "elbow" seat - you know, the one the cart always bumps (see The Wedding Singer for more explanation). Since I was on the aisle, I was able to overhear different conversations and it seemed the group of more tenured ladies sitting around us were having a good time. We started talking to them and found out they are part of a senior ladies tennis tournament and we shared info about our different reasons for visiting vegas and favorite locations. The ladies remarked that they couldn't believe all 3 of us had ordered water at the first go round when I had so many drink tickets. I gave them some of mine and thy vowed to use them on the way back. After landing and going to the place one goes immediately upon landing - that would be the restroom - we overhead the women remarking about me giving them the tickets and how nice that was. Since we were on our way to wreak havoc on the city, it was nice to know it started out with an appreciated gesture.

We waited in one of the restaurants for the arrival of Susan's plane and then Angela's plane and then bustled ourselves into a limo (what you thought we wouldn't go first class?) and dropped our luggage off at the hotel - Residence Inn 2 bedroom suite - and had the driver drop us off at the Hilton where the girls got a little tutoring on slot machines. Some of us lost and some of us won, but we thoroughly enjoyed the process.

The Hilton is the home of the Star Trek Experience and we wasted no time once the store and restaurant were open to explore new life and civilizations, er sorry, to shop and gawk at the plethora of merchandise. Also, there were ferengi and borg walking around to play with, so of course, we did. I believe his words were "female human tall" in a very snarky voice - very ferengi. I tried to stop Aileen from assimilating with the Borg, but as they say "resistence is futile". There is an enormous amount of memorabelia and a timeline to help tie in all the startrek series and movies.

We experienced the 2 interactive rides - one a Borg invasion and the other a Klingon encounter - and had a blast - pun intended. The woman tending the line of the ride was an ex-showgirl and we revelled in hearing her stories of Vegas and travel abroad. It's nice to know that when I'm around 60, yes she was around 60 and looked amazing - I can go work in Vegas. We had lunch at Quarks Bar where the fare is basic, but has cool star trek names. My co-worker from San Diego, Colleen, met us for lunch and we all had a wonderful time.

We then wandered across the street to the Riviera Hotel and picked up our tickets to La Cage - a wonderful drag show. Frank Marino, who plays Joan Rivers and introduces all the girls was on Miss Congeniality 2. Before we went up to the show, we stopped at the Italian Restaurant and had appetizers and dessert with some wine and coffee. While we were there, actors from the Soprano's Last Supper came over and interacted with us - it was a hoot. Thanks to Aileen's newfound Soprano's knowledge, we were able to play with them.

After the show, we cabbed it to the Belaggio where the girls got their first taste of 'classy' Vegas. Then we walked down the strip to the MGM and waited for the shuttle to take us our rooms so that we can have a good night's sleep and prepare for the next days activities.

Nighty Night!

2008 GNI Vegas - Preface

Anne, Aileen, Susan and Angela decided to participate in GNI Vegas. Since I have been there numerous times and none of them had ever been, I was the tour guide - OK and I'm also good at it. Before we left, I made cards that said "My Name is ___ and I belong to Stacey Ronczy. In case of emergency please call" The girls started referring to it as the "Stacey" card as it appeared that I could wrangle us a good deal. Unbeknownst to the most of the girls, I also bought purses from Target (Anne helped me pick them out) and preloaded them with designer kleenex, Hello Kitty bandaids, breath freshner, blistex, and earplugs. Anne bought really cute buttons from the craft store and after everyone picked out their favorites, dutifully sowed them on - thanks Anne! Mine had a martini theme for obvious reasons. These pictures don't really do them justice - they were ubber cute.

I had given the girls a matrix of the many possibilities of things and shows we could do and had them each fill out their favorites and coordinated them and made a day-to-day schedue of how the days would go based on the selections. Yes its' in a spreadsheet and no I'm not showing it here :) Everything fell together nicely and everyone decided to hang together throughout most of the 4 days. Angela and I decided to stay for one more day so we got to hang out together. We love the boys in our life but it was nice for it to be just the two of us. Anne and Aileen being sisters, know each other. Susan and Angela knew each other, but the 5 of us had never been in the same location together for any length of time. The succes of this trips lies somewhat with the personality types of these young ladies and their willingness to be flexible.

My blogging on this will probably be somewhat more lengthy than Anne's as I tend to go into more detail about things I've done and probaby include too many pictures, but there you go. I'm not going to spoil the suprise for those who have not heard about this trip, but suffice it to say a great time was had by all. If you have read Anne's blog, there might be some duplicity here. I have to give Anne credit for some of the pictures that will be included.

Let the show begin....

Long awaited Houston Pictures

Surprise - It's your Birthday

Sorry for the long delay in posting; we've been travelling for business and pleasure and also been sicker than dogs, but we are back on track.

For my birthday - March 5 in case you were wondering - My Husband and my girlfriends threw a surprise party for me. The party was actually on the Friday after my birthday, hence the suprise.

As you can see, I was surprised. I think JR was glad to have all the hush-hush stuff done. Everyone worked very hard to make this a memorable birthday. My sister-in-law Mary flew in from Chicago to spend the weekend with me without me knowing in advance and that was a great gift. My girlfriend Jill came in from Frisco just to see me and announced she was moving to Montana in less than a week! Talk about surprises! Sandy and her son Joey also came and my GNIs - Aileen, Anne, Paden, Laura and Dawn were also in attendance. Aileen's husband Brian, who may have been a little frightened by the amount of progesterone in the room, made Creme Brulee which was a HUGE hit. Aileen made my favorite cake - Red Velvet. A good time was had by all - so much so in fact we really forgot to take pictures.

The next day, our daughter Katheryne suprised me - my last gift - and we got to spend the rest of the weekend together. It was wonderful having Mary and Kat together in our home. That evening, Kat, Mary, Dawn, Brian, Aileen, Anne, JR and I watched a double feature - Hairspray - both the John Waters version and the musical. There was much laughing, food and fun and I enjoyed my birthday weekend very much.

Thanks to all who busted their collective butts to pull off something of this magnitude. As I said that evening, it really means a lot to me that you all went through the trouble.

Run the Republic Official Team Photo

Although the backdrop looks fake, it's actually a view of Denver from the 55th Floor. From left to Right (that would the orientation in the picture, not political views) - Front - Andrew, Bobbie, Sarah, Lynn, Aileen, Stacey. Back - Brian and JR.

Run the Republic Part Deaux

Ok, so here's Team BYGFoot before we

head up the big nasty stairs - you remember 1,098? From Left to Right - Lynne, Brian, Aileen, JR, Stacey, Bobby and Sarah - thanks to Sarah for the photo. The official team photo is forthcoming. Sarah also shared this other picture of her, Lynne and Bobby in front of the Republic Building. JR is already talking about "next year" and how he wants to be in the elite runner category (that would be climbing those 1,098 stairs in under 9 mins).

What doesn't kill you....

Well, this is one day after we did the Run the Republic. The Republic is the tallest building in Denver with 55 floors or 1,098 stairs, as they repeated over and over before we started. I haven't been able to work out for 3 weeks what with the bad back, the wedding, the budgets and the silly training in Boston so I wasn't at all sure of how I would do. Our friends Aileen and Brian were on our "team" as well as some people from JRs office and a friend of a friend, who was just delightful. This is the part where I give JR tons of kudos as he beat the 27 and 28 year old males in our group (it only took him appx 12 mins)! This is also the part where I cursed him for numerous floors while I climbed by myself. As luck would have it, one of the FOAFs hung back with me as he has Asthma and wasn't sure how he would do. We took our time - to be exact we took 1.12 secs per stair - and got done in appx 20 mins! Yippee for us. I can't thank Bobby enough for hanging with me; although he will tell you I hung w/ him. Aileen, Brian, Bobby and I all crossed the finish at the same time, and believe it or not, it was lots of fun. We all went out to Hot Cakes for a much deserved breakfast and then went home. JR and I read, watched golf and then watched the first 4 episodes of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Aileen and Brian were right - It rocks!

On Friday, we saw Vantage Point which was fabulous - ignore the pundits as they are wrong. It's a thinking man's film and was really put together well. On Saturday we saw Michael Clayton and liked that as well.

I'll have a team picture soon.

Our Beautiful Daughter

Our Daughter Katheryne turned 24 in January and I wanted to include a picture of her "Hollywood Glam" party.

The handsome rogue in the picture to the right is her friend Chad.
From the looks of the pictures on her website, it looks like they had a wonderful time.

Oh, My Aching Back

What I didn't relay in the Houston post is that the first day we were there, the very first box I moved, I felt something in my back move and heard it go Pop, Pop; hmmmm not good sounds - oh yeah, and now pain. Well, I didn't let that stop me from helping. I even didn't tell Patti so that her head would not explode. So today, I go to the doctor and she sent me to a Physical Therapist who also saw me today. Apparently, my Sacrum and L5 are not where they are supposed to be - story of my life. So, he worked on my back and got me an additional 45 degrees of movement, so even tho it still hurts, it's at least a little bit more mobile. No working out this week, no sitting, standing, walking or lying down for long periods at a time. The plane ride back was excrutiating, but I'm feeling better after the PT. I'm looking forward to not being in pain.

Houston

Houston was a BLAST! We went to help and by help, I mean organize and effectuate, my friend's daughter's wedding. We left on Thursday and got a handle on what was going on, or not, as the case may be. On Thursday, we took Katheryne and her friend Chad out to dinner at Perry's Steakhouse and had a wonderful visit. The pork chops and the steak were to die for. On Friday, I went all over town with the other person in charge, Kathy, to tie up last minute purchases for the reception. JR stayed at Kathy's office and organized all the prior purchases - linens, sliverware, dinner plates, salt and pepper shakers, etc. He even put them into boxes - one per table - for easy dispersing. That evening, JR and I had about a dozen friends over for dinner at the extended stay suite we were staying in - it was so much fun! It was wonderful to see so many of our friends again. I miss them, but I sure don't miss Houston. On Saturday, it was up early and pack the cars for transporting all the times to the reception hall - an historical firehouse in the historic Heights neighborhood where we used to live. From 9am to 3pm, JR, Kathy, Jeni (my old neighbor) Dawn (my girlfriend's neice who is our age) and myself transformed this room into a romantic paradise fit for a princess. Katheryne came at 2 and took matters into her hands and organized the cake guy, the caterers and the DJ not to mention arranging all the flowers, while we went to the wedding itself. The wedding was held in an historic church in Sam Houston Park which only holds 75; don't sneak anyone in as they do a head count, bride and groom included. The ceremony took all of 15 mins, but accomplished the goal. My girlfriend Patti - MOB - looked amazing and her daughter the bride looked beautiful. Then back to the firehouse to help Kat who apparently had everything well in hand and looked quite beautiful herself. My handsome husband and I danced our butts off and I danced with any other man that stood still too long; Patti's bro Andy, my former neighbor Mike, his friends Mike and Gus, Chad...no one was safe - Patti, the bride, Kat, Dawn....It as a wonderful evening. We got home exhausted but happy as Patti and the bride were very pleased with the results. Pictures to follow, when we receive them.

Boston

Well, my trip to Boston was, unfortunately, a waste of 4 days. The "mandatory training" was going over software that we already use but would have a new look. I learned not one new thing. OK, that's a lie, I learned that unorganized people make me go insane. Wait, I knew that too :) I did get to spend a littl one-on-one with the head of accounting and explained some of our frustrations to him which apparently were a little of a surprise as he had been hearing the accounting people say that the people in the field are the problem. He listened and semed to want to do something about it and let us in on a few changes he already had planned. My budgets are still due, but I didn't work on them when I was gone. We found out that the formulas on several page were wrong, so one of my piers went through ad found the incorrect formulas. Multi-Billion Dollar company can't send out a spreadsheet that has been formatted correctly. So we all have to add time to fix all the formulas. Oh, and keep the expenses flat. Still takes over 2 hours/property. As of this morning, I have 4 more to do and I have to go back and fix the formulas on the ones I finished.
Boston was architecturally pleasing. Lots of beautiful buildings and row house, churches and librarys. Weather was cold and either rain or snow, but not unduly so. We walked wherever we wanted to go and took the subway one day to a historic building that has been converted to a market. We at lovely food at a great restaurant thanks to my boss and the evening was enjoyable. We stayed at the Courtyard at Copley Square where the workout room was the size o the elevator, the waitstaff for breakfast apparently hate their jobs and the icing on the cake was limited hot water the first 2 days (I had about 30 secs of that) and none at all on Friday.
I was happier than a barn full of baby owls to get home and spent the weeend doing household things and enjoying JRs company. Well, off to the grindstone.

Great Quote

Gentlemen, we are going to relentlessly chase perfection, knowing full well that we will not catch it, because nothing is perfect. But we are going to relentlessly chase it, because in the process, we will catch excellence -Vince Lombardi

Lucky Stars

I am so grateful that I have a husband who values me and our relationship, and vice versa. I know many people who have problems with their spouses understanding the simple things. We each have likes, dislikes, hobbies and friends. Sometimes they overlap, but sometimes they don't, and it's all ok. We don't have to be glued to each other although we both enjoy just being in the same space. We can be happy for each other and our success in business without jealousy. We can each go off with our friends and not be concerned with what is happening while we are not there. People flirt with us and neither of us are pissed off about it or blame the other for this independent person DARING to talk to us and find us attractive; we find each other attractive, why wouldn't anyone else?

Deadlines

I love Deadlines - I love the sound they make as they go wizzing by....

I'm Batman, no wait Gumby....

So, I manage retail shopping centers. Part of my job, once a year, is to put a budget for each individual property together. If done correctly, this takes about at least a month if you are lucky, you get 2, to accomplish. You have to talk to vendors to see if they can hold their rate or what their increase will be. You have to see if services need to be adjusted. Walk each property and re-evaluate what capital work (anything that prolongs the "life" of the property and inevitably costs tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands) needs to be done, what can and what can't wait. Review the last 3 years worth of expenses and make sure you are in line - particularly with items you have no control over; How much will it snow, will insurance go up this year, will the utility companies jack their rates and if so, how much.
The reason I explain this is b/c yesterday we got the directive that budgets will be due Feb 15. Accounting hasn't loaded some of the budgets in the system from last year, so we can't analyze and they are not available for us to input into the spreadsheet that's due. Oh right, and the reports I need to run either have to be run by accounting in NY (I don't have access to them) or no one has ever showed me how to run them and our system, although I'm fairly literate with it and have taught myself numerous things, isn't user friendly so I can't just noodle them out.
Did I mention I have to go to Boston for mandatory training next week; I'll be gone 4 days. Then I'm attending a friend's daugter's wedding in Texas, so that's another 2 days. That leaves, today, tomorrow and friday, next monday, and the following monday, tuesday and wed. Oh right, forgot about the 2 hour accounts receivable call, the 2 hour property call, the 1 hour capital budget call (could I reassess this years remaining capital money b/c we may not be able to give it to you given our current cash crunch) and the various meetings I've scheduled before this mandate came down.
No other property manager in my region has 14 props; I'm the only one. They all have 5 or 6. 2 managers just quit, so my VP has to do their budgets. Considering he doesn't know how to run any of the reports he asked us to run, didn't know we don't process any of the utilties in the field nor do we see the invoices so we don't know what meters they run, and he also, is in this mandatry training, it should be interesting.
Did I mention I'm Superwoman?

Why?

And to borrow Anne's quote - WTF?
I'm so tired of being responsible for someone else's work over whom I have no authority nor control. I'm also tired of doing others work that have "don't know how to run that report"-itis. and another thing - why is it when I get conflicting info in order to do my work no one cares enough to fix it.

Okay, stepping off the box and hoping not to break my ankle doing so

Busy Weekend

Saturday brought Blue Skies and temps in the high 50s in Denver so we took off for the mountains to ski. We decided to go to SolVista Basin o ski. It's on the other side of Winter Park, in Granby. It's a small mountain where the greens are lime and the blues are teal. We got to ski for free, so it felt even better to sample this home-town mountain. The weater was perfect, we had a nice lunch in the sun and got in about 13,000 vertical feet whereupon we drove home and promptly took a nap and the watched the NHL All-Star Skills Competition.

I have also become addicted to a new show on Discovery called "Fight Quest". These two guys, one a cage fighter and the other an amateur boxer from New Jersey, travel the world to find interesting ways of martial arts, boxing and finding out how tough you really are. So far, boxing in Mexico, Pencat Silak in in Indonesia and KYOKUSHIN KARATE in Japan. It's fascinating.

Sunday dawned bright and beautiful just for my friend's birthday. We had a brunch for Aileen at our house. Dawn brought potatoes, Paden brought deviled eggs and Anne made Frittatas which were muy yummy. We also had fruit and of course birthday cake. What kind, why red velvet, is there any other? And in honor of Aileen's Birthday, the cake had the Steeler logo and 7 candles for Big Ben. All-in-all a wonderful feast and good fellowship.

Countin It Down

I wish football season was 12 months long!

My friend Aileen and I, along with our hubbies and varied other people have spent the football season at each others homes watching our teams progress along the path to the superbowl. Unfortunately, neither have made it this year. That won't stop us, however, from watching the superbowl, eating fabulous food, chatting, rooting against New England and critquing the coaches. It's been fun to get to know other people and especially to spend more time with Aileen and Brian. All I have left to say is - Go Giants Go (I can't believe after all these years of not liking the Giants that I have to stand behind them - blech)