Where The Grass Is Greener...

America the Beautiful...

Happy Birthday America!!!  I don't care what people are saying about how bad this country is these days...we still have hundreds of thousands trying to become an American every year and we still have our freedom and i'm proud to say i live in the best country this world has ever known!!!  In the words of Lee Greenwood: "...And I'll gladly stand up next to you and defend Her still today.  Cuz there ain't no doubt I love this land, GOD BLESS THE USA!!!!!!"

In honor of our Independence Day, we had some Red, White, and Blue waffles this morning :)

In the words of Delilah...

happy anniversary, happy anniversary, happy anniversary, haaaaaaaaaaappy anniversary!  :)  i just wanted to wish my beautiful wifey a very happy anniversary and provide a little picture story.  (i apologize for the crappy scan job on the pics...crappy government equipment)

once upon a time, these two crazy kids were born...

and then one day they decided they liked eachother........alot.  so they started the turbo-dating days...

and while they may not look like this anymore...

she still looks sexy in his eyes :)  and they can still have those same sparks between them that can start a wildfire...

i wub ya babe and i can't believe you waited for me to wisen up :)  i'm the luckiest guy in the world already and in another 3 weeks you'll make me even luckier!!  thanks for putting up with me and my craziness and i hope you can survive another 60 or 70 years of it because it looks like change is hopeless with me :)

In a trance...

This is our usual morning pose while we are glued to the t.v. watching "eh-mo" :) 

Just a quick quote that won't be as big a deal for you as it is for me, but we've been working on our please and thank-you's withOUT being told "what do you say"...so tonight we asked aubriee if she was ready to get into the bath and she quickly responds "bub-bow? peas." (bubbles, please--for those of you who may need a translation) and for whatever reason it just cracked me up :)  gotta love her.  anyways, more progress on the house!! yay!

Sorry, gotta vent a minute...

I'll apologize in advance for this one folks.  I just gotta get something off my chest.  So  a couple of days ago i mentioned in my post that i had to write my own chemistry test and turn it in last friday.  weeeelllllll, evidently i didn't write a hard enough test for myself.  I checked my grades today and saw a whopping C+!!!!!  Who in this freaking world gets a C+ in a self study course where the teach does absolutely NOTHING except give me chapters to read??????????????  Ok, so maybe you want a couple sample questions to see how easy this test was.  Your wish is my command:

Determine which polymer is likely to be most crystalline: syndiotactic polypropylene, lightly cross linked polystyrene, polymethylmethacrylate, or phenol-formaldehyde.  Justify your answer. Among the four polymers, which do you expect to be the strongest (mechanical strength)? Explain.

and another one:

Derive an equation for a time-temperature-transformation curve as a function of time, activation energy, critical size free energy of formation, volume fraction of crystal to liquid, molecular density, molecular jump frequency, and growth rate for heterogeneous nucleation.  Provide assumptions when necessary.  From this, derive an equation for the cooling rate required to avoid a given fraction crystallized.  Assuming the T-T-T curve shows us that the fastest cooling will be given at 250 K for approximately 5 ½ minutes, what is the activation energy for this ceramic solution, in eV?  If the actual activation energy is 10% lower, what is the temperature necessary for cooling for 5 ½ minutes?  Might this present a problem?

Ok, so maybe those were a little easy???????????  and now i'm done venting.  on to better things.  we stopped by our house today and saw the greatest sight known to man...or at least known to new home builders:

 

 

and as if that wasn't enough...we had the mantle and marble installed on the fireplace (the mantle is actually going to be painted white and not the actual wood color).

 

i don't want to end this post on the downswing, but seriously, if you're building somebody ELSE's house, are you going to smoke inside???  Nothing against smokers at all, i have lots of friends who smoke, but are you kidding me??  and i'm not talking about lighting one up for a minute before you step outside on your break...i'm talking about smoking to thte point that we had to leave the building (OUR HOUSE) because we couldn't take it...wow.  ok, back to a positive note...WE HAVE CABINETS DELIVERED!! YAY!!!!

Gonna have ourselves a nice little saturday...

We had a pretty big saturday today.  Some really good friends of ours out here in ohio got married.  Miranda headed out early to the site to help with pictures and make sure everything was running smoothly (our friend called her awhile back and said she couldn't handle it anymore and asked if she would help her by coordinating her wedding).  Soooooooo, what's that leave daddy and aubriee to do?  Well let me say this.  Here is how you know you're ready for baby #2:  You have a wedding that you need to be at by 1:15.  You wake up with you daughter at 9:00, eat some breakfast, watch elmo until about 10:30 at which time you decide 'hey, we should have time to go to the pool.'  so you change into your gear with your daughter, head up to the pool, hang out and catch some rays until about 11:55.  (You have to leave for the wedding by 1:00)  So you pack up, head back to the house and here's what happens in the next hour:  Both you and your daughter shower, take care of all the bathroom necessities, iron your pants, get dressed, dress your daughter, give her a nice hair-do (and i'm talking ponytail, curling iron, hairspray, the works--this is a huge miracle since you haven't the slightest idea on doing girls' hair cuz you grew up with only brothers), make AND eat lunch, pack up goodies to snack on during the wedding, load up the car and pull out at 12:58.  Who says i'm not ready for another one???  oh, did i mention i took care of little beaner during the wedding all by myself cuz mama was busy running the wedding...while i videotaped the whole thing??  now while it may seem like i've been bragging about myself for this entire post, here is the real truth...my daughter is an absolute ANGEL (knock on wood).  all i can say is she made us look like PRO parents today...absolute angel...even without a nap :)  ok, enough bragging about her for now i guess.  here's a couple of pictures of the new bride and groom:

i thought this was the funniest (and most creative) thing i've seen at a wedding.  they drive up to the reception in a farm combine and you can read the sign that says 'just combined'...hilarious :)

and a closer look at the new mr. and mrs.

and a couple of aubriee (this is after she had been playing awhile so her hair was much better when the day began :) haha)

blowing bubbles:

runnin the slide...

and a family pic after a hard day's work ;)

picture time

just a couple pics from the last couple weeks.

aubriee showing off her 'post-pigtail' hair-do:

taking a dip in aunt karen's pool...niiiiiice and warm ;)

 

taking a drive with my best friend "emmy" (uncle mat would be so proud i'm riding a deere :) haha):

me getting re-introduced to the sweet game of cornhole...here's a couple of nice "action shots":

and one of aubriee relaxing after a hard day's work :)

i hope everybody is having or had a wonderful friday the 13th!!! :)

"Don't call it a comeback (I been here for years)"

Yes yes, i know i've been slacking lately...but i've got some reeeeeeeaaaally good excuses.  First things first, though, we have some more progress on the house.  Drywall!!  And they started painting yesterday so i'll put some more pics up soon after it's painted since drywall is pretty boring.  We have a closing date...July 16th.  Yes, if you recall correctly, that's 6 days before baby's due date.  Lovely.  Oh, and just FYI, the last time we saw the doctor she said that the baby "looks like it might be about 6 days early."  We should have known :) 

anyways, the only excuses i have for not blogging deal with school.  first, a couple weeks ago one of my instructors gave us a take home mid-term to do over memorial day weekend.  this "mid-term" was actually given to us two weeks before the quarter is over.  nice.  oh, and in the instructions he writes "spend no more than 16 hours on this take home exam."  16 hours????  over a holiday weekend????  whatever.

so this week is finals week.  last wednesday  this same instructor who i have for another class that is a self study chemistry course emails me and says "great news!  i've decided what i want to do about your final exam for the self study course.  make sure you carve out a significant amount for it."  so i'm thinking to myself, if this guy didn't think that 16 hours was too unreasonable, what the heck will be a "significant amount of time"???  so i talk to him at the end of the week to find out what i get to do.  the conversation goes something like this:

Travis: "sir, did you want to talk about the final you have planned for me?"

Dr. B: "ahhh, yes.  it's a good one...yada yada yada...i thought it only fitting since this has been a self study course, it be a self made exam.  so here is what you're going to do.  come up with 5 questions on your own and provide the answers to them and hand them in to me on friday."

Travis: "oooookay."

Dr. B: "so make sure you come up with some that you will know the answers to.  and your answers, along with the quality of questions you choose, will determine your final grade."

Travis: "i see."

Dr. B: "i told you it was going to take you awhile to do it.  and i like it because, while i still have to grade the exam, i don't have to take the time to write it."

sooooooooo, this is what i've been dealing with the last week.  two finals on monday in solid state physics and thermodynamics & kinetics of materials and then spending the rest of the week trying to come up with the hardest questions i can while still being able to actually answer the questions.  just FYI, if you ever have the option to write you own test...JUST SAY NO.  but the good news is that the week is finally over, i turned in the 9 (yes, i said NINE) books had used for that self study chemistry course, and now we get to go to a wedding tomorrow for some good friends of ours that we've met here in ohio.  nice. 

oh, p.s., i tried a new banana crunch muffin recipe last weekend for saturday morning breakfast.  i didn't have all the ingredients so i made a slight substitution of my own and they turned out rediculously AWESOME!!  i'll have to share sometime.   

finally...progress

for once, david stern has done something right for the NBA.  a news article revealed today that the league will begin fining players for intentionally 'flopping' after being fouled.  while most will commend stern for this change, all i want to say is IT'S ABOUT TIME!!!!  you ask any NBA player about any pick up games they play in the off-season whether or not they try the same crap.  they'd be laughed off the court and if not pounded into the dirt for being such a baby.  so here's travis' quick fixes if he were to be named commisioner for a day (and then be signed on a 100 year extension worth $80 million a year with $2 billion in guaranteed because they love my work)

• forget fining players for flopping.  not only do you not give them a call, you kick them out for the rest of the game so they can think about what a girl (no offense ladies) they are.
• instead of starting the season in june and ending the season in may, you cut the schedule in half.  do you know why the NFL can charge a minimum of $75 a seat up in the nose bleed section?  because their players actually play the game as if it mattered.  so here's what the NBA needs.  you cut the season in half.  you play each team in your division twice on the road and twice at home.  everyone else in your conference you play once on the road and once at home.  you mix in some inter-conference games to round out the regular season.  you think each game wouldn't be played with a little more intensity?  that's what i thought.
• playoffs.  wow...could they make them any LONGER???  they seriously started like a month and a half ago and we aren't even in the finals yet!!  as much as i would LOVE a NCAA March Madness-like playoff system where you get one game and you're done, i would be willing to give in a little bit and let them play a best of three series.  once again, if you think a team who is down by 15 with 8 minutes left in the 4th quarter would just pack up and rest their starters for the rest of the game so they were fresh for the next game (for those of you who missed it, this is EXACTLY what the spurs did in game 2 against the lakers)?  i mean seriously, IS THIS NOT THE PLAYOFFS???  way to give the fans their money's worth.
• defense.  what in the world is up with this stupid "defensive 3 seconds" rule??  i mean, i understand how it's written in the rule book...but WHY do you have it?  if people want to play a zone, so be it.  if you can't beat the zone, that's your own fault for a) not having a big man who can handle a double team and b) not having any shooters that will DISMANTLE the zone.
• duct tape and blinders.  this is exactly what 95% of NBA players need.  every time back up the court they're jawing at the ref about a call or a non-call or maybe what they'd like for dinner after the game.  seriously, you look ridiculous and every 2 year old in the entire nation couldn't whine as much as you do in a single game.
• one last one.  traveling.  it's a simple concept.  a player gets TWO steps when not dribbling the ball.  i don't care if you make it look all fancy and graceful and non-chalant...if you take more than 2 steps, it's called traveling.  i'm sorry but the tallest man in the world couldn't make it from beyond the arc to the rim in 2 steps so there is no possible way for a 6' 10" shooting guard to do it.

ok, i'm done ranting for now.  i guess my biggest beef is how the NBA affects regular pick-up ball at your local gym.  i've been lucky and the crowd we play with in the mornings play REAL basketball, but the few times i've played in the afternoon while waiting for our mandatory air force PT to start, i just get frustated watching the fairies that walk up and down the court and whine about getting fouled and make one pass TOPS each possesion before heaving up a prayer after taking 6 steps.

ok, now i'm really done.  sorry for the venting :)

Tuesday's Typing

Aren't I the luckiest guy in the whole wide world??

Just a quick mommy update...

• pregnancy is coming along nicely, only 2 more months (easy for me to say, right? :) haha) before the due date.  the doc says the baby is already 4 pounds and it may come a week early...here's to hoping :)
• happy that hot weather is finally here so we can enjoy the cold pool water...and the new maternity swimsuit she just bought at motherhood
• excited for the bachelorette (this is me smiling from ear to ear with excitement, too lol)
• tried out a new smothered chicken and sliced/baked potato recipe tonight that was absolutely delicious.
• at the moment she's screaming at the refs, even if it's on t.v. and they can't hear her, while telling her hubby that "it's a good thing i don't play sports because sometimes i get so mad i just want to punch somebody in the face!"--and she wonders why i always want to do what she wants to do :)
• not happy with the builder right now.  here's a word of advice: if you want a house to get done, make sure you're wife is pregnant during the ending stages because she'll be on the builder every day asking why nobody is out working on the house :)

i think i better get to bed now.  i'm already exhausted and it's only tuesday after a 3 day weekend!

We Salute You

Just a little Memorial Day tribute to my Comrades in Arms who've paid that ultimate sacrifice.  This is one of the many quotes we memorized during freshman year at The Zoo that I happen to take a liking to.

"It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us the freedom of the press.

It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech.

It is the soldier, not the organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate.

It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protestor to burn the flag."

--Father Dennis Edward O'Brian, USMC

Thank you to all Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, and Airmen who have given their lives for this beautiful Country.  And thank you to the families of those whom we've lost, may they never be forgotten.  Only they and Jesus have given their lives for both those who love and hate them.