Bourbon for some reason has become more popular than ever. As a consumer, the ability to try, purchase or own bourbon bottles has become a task for only the wealthy! As a business owner, our main objective is to succeed and make enough money to support our families, without putting an unnecessary strain on the customers wallet! This has become a difficult task with the constant increase in pricing! Stores are gouging consumers. MSRP of a bottle around $60 is now costing bourbon seekers a whopping $115-$300 per bottle. And what do we do about the stores where the managers are taking the rare bourbons for themselves or holding back for certain clientele. It’s become a major issue, but how can it be rectified and will it ever go back to normal availability and pricing? The short answer is no! Greed has taken over. Distillers can’t keep up with demand, stores found a honey pot to get rich quick and only the rich or lucky will be able to taste the ever so rare bourbons out there. Good luck on the hunt and see you all next time!

As if raising a child isn’t hard enough, try doing it while single or with little to no help. That’s the case for a lot of Americans. That is not the case for me. I have plenty of help! There are so many situations in parenthood that are terrible and we shouldn’t take for granted how well we have it. For me, first off, I have an amazing child and an even more amazing family. Never once asked for help, and never once was ever left hung out to dry! My family has been rock solid when it comes to being there for my son and my sisters children. But what happens when the other parent is not so helpful? For the better half of 16 years, life has been fantastic. Financially, my son has been taken care of from day one. Supportively, my son has been taken care of since day one. He is and has been a very busy child. Baseball has been his one and only sport of choice since the time he could walk. Playing at a high level travel team, he was very busy weekly, monthly and yearly. Travel baseball is pretty much year round and we may have had a month off before the next season workouts began. I never missed a game or practice. My lifestyle and my work allowed me to be there for him, allowed me to get him where he needed to be. Allowed me to make the many long distant road trips to games and tournaments. All something he would not have been able to do without me. Like I mentioned, nearly 16 years later, after what was seemingly a perfect lifestyle of balance, I am being dragged into court for custody and more child support. 16 years later!!! No reason for it! He won’t see a cent of that extra support. It’ll all go towards things that will never benefit my him. As for custody, after 16 years, it’s a terrible joke! There are no more my days your days… at this age, the days are about the child. They are his days!!! This is when you try and raise a young man to be respectful, helpful, generous and teach him to have a life he has dreamt of and wants for himself. This is not the time to shelter and control to ruin every moment of his life. Parents out there who use their children as a pawn in whatever BS battle they seem to be involved in, should be ashamed of themselves. Take a long hard look at yourself and ask if what you are doing is solely to benefit your own needs. A child is innocent in everything and dragged into a world of shit when people do not understand life as it should be. Don’t ruin your child’s life because you are unhappy. If you have failed, that’s on you! If you don’t have what your neighbor has, that’s on you! All I know is not one of your mistakes or failures in life were the fault of your child. Do better to see and understand the needs of those around you and do less of trying to control things that should be left alone.