This is Pete. He worked for me for 15 years and Friday he retired. We had a little dinner celebration for him last night.

If you think Pete looks like Willie Nelson it is because he does, right down to the long braid you can't see in the picture.



On the right in this picture is Eric, who I started training from scratch when was 19. Pete pretty much finished his training over the last 6 years. Eric will be taking over as lead guy and has a brand-new apprentice of his own to train. He's nervous and excited but I'm not worried. He'll be fine. At some point Eric will retire and Max can take over, but it's likely I will be dead long before then.



The two bottles of Jack Daniels are pretty much all you need to know about how Pete has settled in over the last 5 years. We asked what he wanted for a retirement gift and he told us - Jack Daniels. We both know better than to get him anything other than what he asked for - he won't take it.

For is birthday I gave him some fancy commemorative Jack Daniels to jazz things up and his wife told me that he's never opened the bottle. That's not what he drinks. He drinks Jack Daniels.

The kind in the black bottle.

Congratulations, Pete!

As an aside, the party was at Pete's favorite restaurant. It's a rather French sort of thing where they know his name and his favorite dishes. Doesn't seem like some place he'd like but he does. It's complicated.

It's a very, very good restaurant. I had lamb chops with sherry cream sauce. Have you tried sherry cream sauce? OMG.

I'd eat it on plywood.

At least he drinks black.

He drinks it like medicine. One shot, down the hatch and follow with Coca-cola. One per hour. No more, no less.

This guy is firmly set in his ways.