Retiring from retirement

When Dee Trease and her husband Tom sold the Roadrunner Restaurant and Saloon in New River Ariz,. back in 2003, they thought they were moving to the Platte Valley to retire.

Turns out Dee is great at running bars and restaurants but is terrible at retiring.

Almost immediately after moving to the Riverside-Encampment area, the two veteran restaurant/bar owners bought the Mangy Moose and ran it successfully until they sold the bar in 2011.

Once again Dee was ready to retire, but when her husband Tom passed away a year later Dee knew she needed to stay busy. "I got bored and wanted to get the family into the business," Dee said.

In July, Dee, "in cahoots" with her son Eddie Swing and daughter Angie Lara, opened D's Bar & Grill in the building formerly known as The Kat House in Encampment. "We had to put in just about everything from a walk in cooler, to the bar plumbing ... There's something new to do every day," Swing said of the challenges involved in getting D's up and running.

Dee's boasts a small but varied menu that includes the regular bar fare, but has been well received in the community. In mid November, D's started doing breakfasts Fridays through Sundays from 7 to 11 a.m.

D's is also striving to be family-friendly, which is why Dee has installed a smoke-eater designed to reduce the cigarette smoke from the bar area so that it doesn't bother guests in the dining room, which is non-smoking.

"We also have a very nice porch where [when the weather gets warmer] there is plenty of room for people to hang out if they don't want to be in the bar," Dee said.

D's tentatively plans on having some outdoor music this summer, but they still have to figure some things out.

If her years of experience have taught Dee anything, it is to take things one step at a time. If the regular patrons of D's Bar and Grill are lucky then Dee will stay retired from retirement for a long time to come.