Pee-tah Pan snoozin

Luke has taken it to the next level.

Having trouble posting

I have to admit... I am having trouble posting anything because that picture of Luke is so freakin cute. Anything I post that lowers that photo and story to the blog archives is just gonna be lame.

Papa Travis Short Stories

For those of you who don't know I am a super duper ultra mega "Luke" fan. I border on annoying (even to my wife) when talking about how crazy happy my little boy makes me. At least several times a day I feel like I will spontaneously combust. I know part of it stems from my own struggle "growing up" and like the Robin Williams Peter Pan from the bizarre film "Hook" my happy thought really is being a Dad and is the only way I cope with adulthood.

So the following is a collection of some short accounts of my life with Luke. Let me know your fave.

"Peter Pan Sleep Aid"
Over recent weeks Luke has developed an obsession with Peter Pan. On some days he will only allow us to call him Peter (In a british accent by the way.. Pee-tah) Heidi is "Tink", and I am "Hook". Well of course he is going to be Pan for Halloween and Heidi being the skilled artisan she is made his costume. His favorite detail of the outfit is the belt and scabbard for his knife. He has progressed into using an actual toy knife. For weeks he used a medicine dropper that he tucked it into his diaper. The only problem with this is he is so passionate about his Peter Pan stuff it makes him naughty. One night we put him to bed without his Pan gear because he was being so bad. He ended up crying and crying. After about 90 minutes I went in and knelt by his bed... he proceeded to grab both sides of my face and with all the sincerity he could muster looked at me and said "Dada please, dada please Pee-tah Pan sword. Please."

Of course I relented, gave him his knife and scabbard and left the room. I walked into a silent room 60 seconds later to find this picture. He was out like a light.

"BM Breath"
Over the course of Luke's two and a half years I have had the opportunity of changing a few diapers. I am one of those dads that is willing to get down and dirty when needed. (sidenote: I have a few friends who have never changed their kids diapers... how did they pull that one off?) Well as most parents know, once the deed is done there is an immediate panic to dispose of the used diaper as fast as possible. I am particularly careful about where these dirty bombs end up so my typical routine is to drop it into a plastic bag, tie it, and then stick it in the outside garbage. This scenario seems harmless to the untrained but pay attention... once you place the diaper in the plastic bag and tie it you are left with a plastic bag poop balloon, because as you tie the top of the bag it retains the air. I repeat no matter how tempted you are, DO NOT squeeze the bag to get the air out. If you do, you will receive a shot of musty, warm, stink air. I kid you not, if poop had breath this would be it. I unfortunately have not heeded my own advice. Just the other day I did it not thinking and I received such a shot of BM breath that my head jerked violently and hit the side of the wall.

Heidi thought it was hilarious.


"Dad"
From a very early age Luke began testing out his terms for me. His current list contains, Travis, Dada, Dad, and Hook. However recently he only calls me "dad" with kind of a direct and forceful tone. This concerns me because he is ONLY 2 YEARS OLD! At this rate I will be reduced to "Travis" by the time he is 7, "Mr. Snyder" by the time he is 12, and "that old guy" by the time he is 16!

I still remember making the transition from Daddy and Mommy to Dad and Mom myself. It was a big deal to me! My older sister started calling them the shortened versions a few years earlier and I was so distraught when she did I had a conversation with her about it. Oh well he still loves me just in more professional way.


future stories:
"My Onesie Obsession"
"Workday"

Fall in the canyon

Me and my boy up the canyon behind our house. Winter can be a real pain, but getting there sure is beautiful.

Stream of Consciousness

Advanced Warning: This is a stream of consciousness blog and there will be no organization, unecessary punctuation, and forethought to the words that will follow. You will therefore be without a filter and fully exposed to the random thoughts of my brain.

Read if you dare....

So i have insomnia. It's like the moment I know I am supposed to sleep i can't. the irony is that I am exhausted all day? go figure. Last night Luke wouldn't go to bed and i was lacking the energy for parental discipline so we watched a movie and he spent the full 2 hours crawling all over me, jumping, wrestling, and sitting on my head. I think we finally crashed around 2am. In the end i was grateful for the company and memories of his crazy eyes looking at me asking for more pretzels.

(Feist "i feel it all" is playing on itunes right now. A good tune for anyone interested.)

The project wars took place over the weekend. Heidi got a nice bee in her bonnet to spend the days canning fruit! I have a love hate relationship with this. For 3-4 days the kitchen is wreck and I feel like my house is a small production factory. to complicate matters I decided to make the same weekend a home improvement opportunity. our kitchen had no backsplash and as the name implies there is some splashing that takes place particularly behind the sink. with me being OCD I couldn't take it anymore as the dry wall and paint was looking funky. we finally chose a tile style and layout we were happy with and i proceeded to make it happen. Picture Heidi and I rotating in the kitchen as she cuts and boils fruit while I carefully place tiles on the wall. this environment is a hotbed for couple meltdown but miraculously we came out of the weekend unscathed!

Now there are lovely cans of fruit on the counter with a nice tile backplash backdrop. go team treidi.

Luke was not to be out done by our projects as he obsessed over his puzzles. He has become some kind of puzzle dynamo over the last few weeks. he sits on the wood floor in between the kitchen and front room and does his puzzles over and over again. He is so concentrated that he breathes heavy while he does them... he is up to 5-8 year old puzzles. Not bad for a little scrappy two year old. If only he could apply this apparent intellect to potty training... I think he just doesn't feel like it yet. it's like , "look dad i have my whole life to wear big boy undies and use the potty. why be in a rush? I'll get to it when I'm ready."

i am happy with the resurgence of blog writing by myself and other friends and family. For some reason it is easier to get to the real substance of what is going on with each other. we don't have to waste time calling and saying...

so...
how is it going?
good and you?
oh fine.... well... what's new?
not much you?


my stream has dried up I'm outta here.

Timing Markets

In the early 1900's a man named Bernard Baruch ruled the New york stock Exchange. He became an investing legend and ended up advising several US presidents. Well, during the 1920's there was a stock market craze going on and one morning on the way to work Baruch stopped for a shoe shine. As he sat there the guy working on his shoes started giving him stock tips. Baruch didn't say a word to the man but simply stood up, walked to his office and sold his entire portfolio. Of course the market crashed soon after.

So what does this story mean? It means that when someone in a "shoeshiner position" has been educated into an investment strategy enough to be giving advice it is probably a sign that the market has run it's course. I have recently experienced this phenomena in the wild world of Real Estate. We moved from California about a year ago when the market was beginning to soften and it was so fascinating because while there I watched people go crazy about real estate, everyone was either a loan officer, agent, investor, or remodel house flipper (including myself). Over the last year in Utah I have observed the same pattern. Everyone here is drunk on the 100k they "made" in house appreciation. So they are building spec houses, remodeling, buying building lots, and just plain going crazy!

I think I was fortunate to have just witnessed the California slow down so I was a bit less agressive here. Well about two months ago I was at a friends house and I had a "Baruch shoe shine" moment. My friend had 3 or 4 buddies over who were pretty young and uneducated and they started giving me real estate investing advice. They each had several spec homes being built and other projects going. I ended up not saying a word about my own experience but when the encounter ended I was consumed with the desire to sell anything and everything to get out of the market.

With the recent events of the lending industry being on it's ear and foreclosures at a higher rate today than during the great depression it's obvious that things have run their course on the recent boom. Everyone has to remember to ask themselves when they hear about some money making investment strategy, "Am I at the beginning, middle, or end of this trend?" Bottom line... to time an investing market you have to buy low and sell high. You know you have reached the "low" or beginning of a market trend when prices are down and there isn't some buzz going around. You are at the end or "high" of the trend when everyone and their dog is doing it.

By the way how many house flipping shows are on TV right now? I lost track after the flip this house and flip that house came on the air:)

Blog addition... here is the ugly uniform I referenced in the blog below. Yes they look like dark blue pajamas with white bibs. It was horrible. Compare it with the classic uni below... no contest.

The Prodigal BYU Football Son

I have recently experienced a great irony... I like BYU football again.

I never would have thought it possible... but it is true. Growing up I loved it. A performance of the Cougar "Ra Ra" fight song was required to go to bed at night. But something happened in the intervening years between my dad standing over my bed at night pumping his fist to my tenure at school there from 2001 to 2005.

I despised the football team.

From their state of the art indoor practice field to their exclusive Locker room and restaurant they made me crazy. Coincidentally this is also the time period that some genius thought to change the traditional uniforms to some variation of gold and ultra dark navy blue. (hint: they were very ugly) Maybe it was a reflection of jealousy on my part but the players represented everything my school experience was not... easy, glamorous, and full of hand outs. They definitely seemed to be governed by a different set of rules than me as I slaved at my campus job, studied my guts out, and stressed if i forgot to shave that day.

Well, for this season my Dad invited me to the kick off game against Arizona. There I was in section 00 seat 24 looking at the player's in the old uniforms and listening to my Dad chant the familiar fight song.... It was back. I was definitely into it. They even retired one of my old school favorite's number, the legend, Ty Detmer. I left the game hoarse from yelling and have since frequented a host of websites dedicated to cougar fans. I now know all the players names, stats, and I have even put my boy to bed a few nights with a certain fight song. The prodigal returns.

Rise and shout the cougars are out.

Christmas Capitalist

Okay, if I hear one more person go off on a self righteous/I never bought anything on Christmas/why is it so commercialized? sermon I am going to puke. My big question to all of you is this, "what's the freaking problem? are your True meaning of christmas sensibilities so fragile that the commercial element of the holiday has the ability to destroy every bit of your Christmas goodness?" I'm sorry, but I need a lot more than a few lame commercials and a full parking lot at the mall to get me down. I just don't feel threatened by businesses making a bunch of sales over the holidays, my deeper spiritual feelings for what it represents are completely seperate. Truth is, when I drive by the packed mall, I think to myself "good for you mall... I hope those maniacs shop til they drop!" One individual I know (no I won't name names), gets so worked up about our "commercialized Christmas" that when she talks about it her cheeks swell up big and red and I literally think she is going to explode. Here is one of her more idiotic quotes I'd like to analyze, "That's why I like thanksgiving, they haven't figured out a way to ruin it yet!"
1. She prefers Thanksgiving simply as a reaction... pretty fair weather if you ask me
2. Who is "they"? it's like she thinks a secret club of rich evil doers exisits that is bent on ruining all holidays.
3. This secret club of wicked people is currently devising a way to also ruin thanksgiving (I hear they are working out a way to get coupons inside turkeys) and any other currently "pure holiday" we all better watch out.
4. The overall tone is that there is a massive conspiracy and everyone is a victim of it. (sidenote: I have a big problem with empowering others and making myself a victim, this deserves it's own blog).
5. This one is probably the worst, in so many words, she says that Christmas is currently ruined, and no one currently existing is having any fun or making any great memories.

For my final point, I turn to the final chapter from our beloved Charles Dickens "Christmas Carol" which represents the pureness of the holiday.
"It's Christmas Day!" said Scrooge to himself. "I haven't missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!"
"Hallo!" returned the boy.
"Do you know the Poulterer's, in the next street but one, at the corner?" Scrooge inquired.
"I should hope I did," replied the lad.
"An intelligent boy!" said Scrooge. "A remarkable boy! Do you know whether they"ve sold the prize Turkey that was hanging up there -- Not the little prize Turkey: the big one?"
"What, the one as big as me?" returned the boy.
"What a delightful boy!" said Scrooge. "It's a pleasure to talk to him. Yes, my buck."
"It's hanging there now," replied the boy.
"Is it?" said Scrooge. "Go and buy it."

*What is the first thing Scrooge did once he learned his all night Christmas lesson... he went shopping!

First Crush

It's officially happened, my one year old son (he'll be two on Dec.29) has his first official crush and it is with an animated drawing named "Jane". I am not sure if it is because of her bookish smarts, english accent, or deep green eyes, but he is hooked. When he first started watching the disney film Tarzan he thumped his chest, yelled, and rolled around the floor like a monkey. But now, he sits there longingly and stares at the TV saying, "Jane, Jane!". It is further proof that women keep men from being super cool and turn them into little woosies. (sp? I don't think I have ever spelled "woosie" before?weird.) It is freaky to admit, but I think every person has a little bit of a crush on at least one disney character. I told my wife that I'd want to hook up with Esmerelda from the hunchback of Notre Dame and she got all offended! Excuse me but gypsies are hot! Here are my top three Disney crushes...
1. Esmerelda
2. Pocahantas (yes, I like the free spirited women)
3. Jane (like father like son)

So which Disney characters float your boat?

The Little Caesars Mystery

Dear Little Caesar, I recently purchased one of your hot and ready 5 dollar pizzas and I have a few questions for you... How in the world can you charge only five dollars for a pizza and still make money? The fast food industry is the only business currently going in reverse of inflation? The more I ponder this question, the more troubled I feel about your possible answers. Here are the most plausible methods I think you guys use to generate profits... 1. Pizza ingredients/ I guess you could save some kind of money by buying highly discounted and inferior dough, sauce, and cheese. Where do these ingredients come from? A third world country where little villagers manipulate tomatoes and bread dough? What are the side effects for consuming them? 2. Employees/ Because this is the other cost involved in creating that 5 dollar bargain it must also be source for saving huge revenues. How cheap are your employees? are there rules about hygiene and basic food handling skills? I worry about this one because I imagine highly qualified fast food workers are more expensive and because your pizza is so cheap... well it means your workers must stink. So when you have a second, would you please reveal this mystery to me? See I need to know when I am in the middle of pounding your pizza if if I am consuming pretend food that will give me a strange disease or if I am esimply eating dirty food made by dirty people. PS-while you are at it, could you also ask your buddy Wendy how she profits on her lovely Jr. bacon cheeseburgers? I have similar concerns with her.

Ray LaMontagne

Ray LaMontagne is an amazing recent talent I've discovered. When I heard his voice I thought he was a soulful black man... well take a look at the video and see what you think. Regardless his music is sweet and he just came out with a new album... "till the sun turns black"

The Master Cleanse

Once again I have had a lapse in my blog writing. You'll be happy to know that during my lapse I have created 5 drafts that were never quite good enough to post. They start all cool and then just disappear because I have to get up and do something else. I hate it when people tell me they're busy, mostly because I fell like they are insinuating that I haven't been busy too. But the truth is lately I have barely made time to shower and put clothes on. Anyway on to the title of this blog... For the last four days I have been doing this thing called the master cleanse that some hippie herbalist guy made up to give people diarrhea. The main gist of it is you go on a liquid diet for 10 to 40 days. The real kicker is the liquid you drink is a ghastly assortment of 3 flavors. Here they go: 1. First thing when you wake up you drink 32 ounces of uniodozed salt water. This is the most horrible experience ever. I've done it 4 days now and I mostly stand over he sink gagging. Just thinking about drinking it tomorrow morning makes me want to cry. 2. Throughout the day you drink a lemonade concoction that is definitely no countrytime product. It is freshly squeezed lemon, natural maple syrup, and the real kicker pure cayenne pepper. Each time I swallow it feels like fire tracing down to my gut. 3. This one is actually the best of the three, herbal laxative tea. My particular brand is aptly named "smooth move" for obvious reasons. I can tell you when I am pulling a dumb and dumber on the toilet I don't feel too smooth. Anyway if anyone out there wants and adventure... I dare you to do this thing. Try lasting longer than me. I'll keep you posted.

"Enjoy The Weather"

another lance commercial... I've been super busy.

Lance Armstrong - Nike Commercial - The magnet

Lance Armstrong - Nike Commercial - The magnet

Move and Groove

Well, the DMB concert was stellar and we successfully made the move back to a land of seasons. I need to write a blog now about how Utah's dryness and pollen turns me into a raisin with sinus problems. I was in the process of writing an amazing blog about the drugs scandal in cycling and other sports but my wife "accidentally" erased it (she is so jealous of my precious work). I've been so broken hearted about it, that it has been hard to post again. Nevertheless I will press on and maybe try to re-write it. I am curious, to other bloggers out there. Do you write in word or something and then paste into the blog or just write straight into it. This recent experience has shown me it is a risky proposition with power failures and naughty wives around.

Lucky VIP

Sometimes I really get frustrated with how negative I can be about the events of life. I am sure that if you asked my wife whether I emphasize positive or negative things, she would say negative. I am not sure why that is. Perhaps it is a reflection of my personal paradigm and view of the world. Or maybe it is that a really bad day is so much more satisfying to vent about than a good day. It is somehow therapeutic to describe the unfortuante events of bad traffic, some idiot you encountered, or a clumsy injury you sustained (I recently ran full speed into a closed sliding door but that's another blog). So, as a reaction to my normal tendency I want to share some positive news. I just found out that some friends of ours have secured my wife and I 2 VIP tickets to the upcoming Dave Matthews concert. Apparently they are in some box right by the stage where we are served food? Okay that's insane. I went to a DMB concert like 2 years ago and I saw the VIP box and was consumed with massive concert jealousy. As a sidenote I think the concert pecking order is so funny and weird. It's like the moment we enter the venue we all digress into a temporary caste system based on our seat location and VIP status. That is why mosh pits and general admission is such a favorable survival of the fittest. Anyway, the moral of this story is that I am going to enjoy this concert with all the power I possess and if I start getting down on a bad day I have to remember my VIP night with Dave and company by singing a song from their concert set list, I'll have about 15 songs to choose from. So look for me on the 405 in traffic singing "satellite" at the top of my lungs.

Mercy of Marc

I just discovered that my blog made it out of my buddy's blog graveyard. His mercy and long suffering with me knows no bounds. Thanks.

Climate

Well we're moving out of California and I've got mixed feelings, pure excitement and major sadness. So to make me feel better about leaving the sunshine state I have been thinking of its major downsides. Here is one... Seasons exist for a reason. Over the last year and a half the temperature in Manhattan Beach hasn't deviated more than 10 degress either way and I am beginning to go crazy. The range is typically 72-82 degress. Whats wrong with that you say? I'll tell you. Fourth of July weather was 3 degrees warmer than Christmas weather and Halloween was 1 degree colder than New Years. I have no sense of time and my memory is defunct because I can't access a seasonal timeline to remember when things happened. I have no doubt that if some Southern Californian dude entered a coma and then reawoke he would be unable to state the month or even the season they are in. So the total irony is that living in 75 degree paradise makes you simultaneously unappreciative of the good weather and completely unable to cope with temperatures outside the California spread.There was some lightening out here the other week and people were declaring the end of the world. If it rains for two days all the news reports turn into "Flood Watch 2006". There is even a dry wind that shows up here every fall named the Santa Ana winds that throws the South Bay into a fit. Dry skin lotions sell out of the stores and people barricade themselves inside with humidifiers.The worst part of it for me is I've turned into one of them. I'm scared to re-enter the real world of seasons. What if my finely tanned, climatized, moisturized body can't survive?

Resurrection

(The artwork above is courtesy of my brother in law, he has mad paint skillz. It was inspired by the AVP Manhattan Beach Open this weekend)

Okay... I am back. I must admit I feel embarassed at my inability to keep this blog going. It's like my journal where 80% of its entries are apologies for having not written in it for the previous six months. "8/10/06 Dear journal: I can't believe I haven't written in here for 5 years. I will never do that again! Well since my last entry I dated a girl, got married, graduated college, had twins, bought a house, sold it, bought another one, got fired, got hired, had another kid and I think that is about it. Talk to you tommorow..." then after this entry the cycle would just start all over again with another 3-5 year gap. Anyway time will tell if this is one of those same things... Stay Tuned