On March 22nd, a hillside that was saturated with water from earlier rains gave way. A wall of mud, trees, and debris swept over the North Fork of the Stillaguamish River and covered an unincorporated area known as Steelhead Haven located 4 miles east of Oso, Washington. Mud, trees, and other debris covered an area of Steelhead Haven measuring 1,500 feet long, 4,400 feet wide and between 30 and 40 feet deep, roughly 1 square mile.
Unless you’ve totally unplugged from all news media and the internet over the past week, you’ve heard of the Heartbleed bug. The Heartbleed bug (it’s not a virus) is a vulnerability in the OpenSSL library, the software that makes your website and other sites secure when a person is reviewing banking records, making a purchase from your company, or updating their information or method of payment in their on-line account.
A friend of a friend called me a couple of weeks ago who wanted my professional opinion. Our mutual friend suggested he call me as he’d been in an accident a couple of months ago and was not happy with the way his claim was being handled. He’s not a client but wanted to know what his options were.
The floor for the Final Four is laid and ready at AT&T Stadium, the home of the Dallas Cowboys. Additional seating has been added, the concert venue has been prepped and the countdown to the tip off for the NCAA’s Final Four is well underway. College basketball’s flurry of activity to crown a national champion is one of the biggest sporting events of the year, only rivaled by the NFL’s Super Bowl.
I received an email from a friend and client of mine a couple of weeks ago. She’s a single executive in her 40’s at a company in Dallas and she wanted to meet for coffee to discuss long term care insurance. Her email contained an amount of coverage she wants to have, so I gathered the information I needed to construct a quote to help guide our discussion.
The last time I was “awarded” a speeding ticket was 10 years ago. Jonathan, his mom, and I were headed to College Station, Texas to celebrate Jordan’s birthday. I turned off I-45 in Madisonville when a local police official pulled behind me, switched on his lights, and pulled me over for speeding. I was, tried to talk my way out of it (I wasn’t paying attention, etc.) but it didn’t work; I still ended up with a speeding ticket.
Last week, I helped a family in Allen, Texas change their home and car insurance from the carrier they were with to one of the insurance companies we work with. The wife and I were reviewing what the new home insurance policy covered and she asked an excellent question: does the new policy cover the air conditioning unit? Instead of simply answering her question, I wanted to confirm what she meant by the policy covering the air conditioning unit. It turns out, she wanted to know if the home insurance policy will replace their A/C unit when it wears out.
I’m currently working with several small business owners regarding their commercial insurance needs. One of the questions each of them have asked is what commercial insurance do they need to adequately protect themselves and their businesses. The answer is it just depends on the business. Some need general liability, others need business property coverage, and a couple need professional liability or errors and omissions (E&O) coverage.
My mom has discovered texting at 79 years of age. It’s very entertaining to read the text messages she sends. My mom feels like a technology power user because she discovered she doesn’t have to type text messages on her Android smart phone; she has speech to text capability. What’s entertaining is the spelling that comes through on her texts due to her thick Southern drawl.
On the afternoon of April 17, 2013 a fire broke out at the West Fertilizer Company in West, Texas, a town located a little more than an hour’s drive south of Dallas and Fort Worth on Interstate 35. The first responders to the fire included 10 members of the West Volunteer Fire Department, along with 2 other people who pitched in to help. At 7:50 that evening, an explosion rocked the West Fertilizer Company killing 15 people including the 12 people who responded to the fire and injuring about 200 people in town.
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