A New-ish Years update!

Hi everyone! I know it's been a while since I reached out to you all so I wanted to take some time to put together another blog post!

 I'm doing well even though it's been a rough couple of months. This winter sales season at the shop was noticeably slower than past years so the partial government shut down couldn't have come at a worse time for my small business. I usually get subcontracts for government work year round and I haven't gotten any since the shutdown. I live in an area not too far from D.C. and I rely on lots of the local population for business. A lot of them also happen to work for the government, and with the economic anxiety/no disposable income to spend my business flow has dropped significantly over the last month and is yet to pick back up. The one area of my business that is steady is my Drager interlock business. If I haven't mentioned it before one part of my business is that I have a contract with Drager interlock and and I'm certified through them to install breathalyzers for anyone in the area that gets a DUI. If you are caught drinking and driving in MD regardless if you beat the charge 90% of the time the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration will require you to have a breathalyzer installed in your vehicle for a minimum of 6 months, but usually for a year. So when I install the device you have to blow into the machine in your car and not have any alcohol in your system before the device will allow you to start your vehicle. In case you wanna see how the device works here's a link lol. Since I've had free time I've been designing the food truck that my business partner is launching. He will be launching his own food truck and then we plan to buy a couple more and lease them to local restaurants in return for a percentage of their profits. Below is a picture of the food truck we are currently working on. This is the one my business partner is launching. Since we have a shop called "Custom Connections" he thought branching off from the brand name would be appropriate so he is naming his food truck business "Custom Cuisines". Other than being paid to design the truck I have nothing to do with the "Custom Cuisines" food truck business but I will be going in 50/50 on future food truck ventures. Even if business has been slow I'm optimistic that business will pick back up soon, and I continue to move forward in other ways to secure a good future for myself (fingers crossed)!

The Custom Cuisines food truck.

My design of how the food truck will look once it's done!

My parents love to travel and they flew to Argentina last month to spend 3 weeks seeing some beautiful sites! Before they left I picked up their cats (well really our cats, but the cats live at my parents house year round) and kept the cats at my place. One of the cats, Gopi, has cancer and I've been very concerned about his health. He went from being a 22lb cat to a 9lb cat in a short amount of time. The good news is he doesn't seem to be in any pain. After doing some research and modifying his diet to benefit a cat with cancer I'm happy to say I got him to gain some weight! That made me happy as well as just having my good cat friends at my house. Below are a couple of pics of Gopi and Chai. Gopi is the white/gray/black cat. They are brothers from the same litter and have been together their whole life.  

Here are some pictures from my parents' trip:

 My parents in a boat close to the Iguaza falls.

 Another picture of the Iguaza falls.

 The Perito Merino glacier.

Watching penguins in Punta Arenas Chili.

Here's a couple of pics of the cats:

 Gopi seeing if my baked potato is worth his time lol.

Gopi and Chai sharing a bed

At the same time I had the cats I found out that my biz partner Mike had to find a new place for his dog. His dog Remy (a brown nose pit) is 10 years old and very sweet. She mostly likes to sleep, eat and be around people/ get attention. I will be taking in Remy to stay at my place after I return the cats to my parents (around the 10th of feb). I have looked after Remy a time or two in the past at my house and am looking forward to having her live with me! I love animals and wish I could take more in if I had the time/space. 

Below is a picture of Remy sleeping on my couch.

Remy doing her favorite thing, sleeping!

Last weekend was my girlfriend's daughters birthday. Her daughter's name is Hailey. She just turned 8 years old! She's growing so fast! I took her and my girlfriend out last Saturday to celebrate her birthday. We went to a haunted indoor miniature golf place. It was her first time miniature golfing and she loved it! After that we went to a new korean bbq restaurant which was great as well! Will definitely be going back there again :) 

Hailey wearing a knitted hat her mom made for her!

Haunted miniature golf!

Hailey playing mini golf.

Now that the polar vortex has passed it's supposed to be 60 degrees tomorrow so I hope to enjoy the weather before it dips back down. Hope you all are good! Glad I could take a minute to give you all an update and I hope to be able to meet you all in person this year!

Love,

Phil