Catching up a little ...

My apologies for not posting sooner. I've been pretty busy after work for the past week or so. I'll explain ...

First of all, the marathon was a great success. John, Chris, Harrison, Keenan (wildfire team leader) and Chad all ran the full marathon, with John finishing at an impressive 3:36. This is his sixth marathon. Joanna, Jared (E4), Hawk (a FS guy) all ghost-ran the half marathon. I capped for Nikki, so that she could get some ISP hours by volunteering (capping is when you try to inform and recruit new members for AmeriCorps by setting up tables and booths at public events, schools, etc). Capping was actually pretty successful, we met a lot of people and got the word out. Blake and I left early to go grocery shopping, as it was a Sunday.

Last week wasn't anything special in particular. We went back to one of the camp grounds, Kelly Dahl, where we had cut at the beginning of the season. We had a few more trees (160 or so, allegedly) to cut and chip. The bole wood (the trunk itself) was going to be collected for industrial purposes. So, in addition to limbing the tree and chipping the slash, we had to drag all of the boles to the road and try to line them up.

It also snowed last week. It made cutting particularly chilly. I had two pairs of long underwear on the one day.

The real reason I wasn't able to get online much last week was because we were working on our gift to the Forest Service. It is a yearly tradition that the wildfire team gives a gift to their Forest Service work center. There is a basketball net, as well as some adirondack chairs and a birdhouse from previous classes. For the longest time, we could not come up with an idea. Then someone suggested a soap box derby car. It seemed amusing and fun, but it never materialized.

Finally, the weekend before last we said, "Okay. Are we going through with this? If not, we need to find something." It wasn't a firm goal, but we really wanted to have the gift done prior to the seasonals getting laid off (they all turned in their gear this past Friday). The soap box derby car, we finally admitted, wasn't going to work - it was fun, but it didn't really relate to our work, nor did it serve any real purpose. Suddenly, someone suggested a porch swing. That weekend, Blake and I went online to find plans on how to construct a swing, as well as a frame for it (we didn't think hanging the swing from the bunkhouse awning would be a good idea since it's not our place). We got all the plans and a list of materials. On Monday, Ervin went down to Boulder to take care of a few things while we were all at work. While he was in Boulder, he got everything we needed at Home Depot.

We started working on it Tuesday night. That evening, we snuck into the work center and cut all of the pieces for the porch swing itself. On Wednesday, we couldn't do anything because the work center was being used after work. Thursday, we constructed the porch swing and cut some of the pieces for the frame. On Friday, I actually went down to Boulder to see a show, but the people who stayed in for the night assembled the frame.

We were going to hang the swing on Saturday, but then ... around 3:00, we heard that there was a fire started by a car along the side of the road near Lyons (outside of Boulder). The seasonals had just turned in their gear the day before, so we were pretty much the only resources left on our forest, aside from Chad, Egan and Owens. Chad told us to be ready, just in case it panned out. Well, it did. Paul, Chris and I moved our stuff to one of the squad trucks, while everyone else made phone calls to get everyone who was in Boulder back up to the bunkhouse. We managed to get everyone rounded up and head out in less than two hours. Once we got to the fire, we dug some line around it with the other firefighters who were there. After that, we laid out some hose and mopped up until after dark. We wrapped up and headed back to Boulder. On the way back, Chad got us dinner at a really cool New Orleans-style restaurant in Lyons called Oscar Blues.

They requested us for the next day, so we all got up early and headed out. There wasn't any food in the house, because Sunday is normally my shopping day. Luckily, we managed to get someone to go for us (I made a list while I was eating breakfast on the off-chance that we could swing such a favor). But in the mean time, there wasn't really anything to bring for lunch, so we all ate MREs (Meal Ready to Eat, or Meal Rarely Enjoyed, if you prefer). It's a little funny because this fire was a few firsts for me: it was my first local fire (a little crazy, considering it's the end of a quiet fire season and I managed to get to do two national dispatches). It was also the first time I had ever eaten an MRE. Somehow, I got through two dispatches without eating them. So everyone told me I had to eat one, which was fine because I couldn't pack a lunch anyway. So I did. It wasn't bad at all; I had spaghetti with meat sauce, as well as some crackers and cheese spread.

We spent the second day gridding for a spot fire that had popped up across the road -- we found it, it was dead out. After lunch, we then mopped up until they let us go. Chad gave us off on Monday. We presented the swing to everyone after we got back from the fire. We're going to hang it tonight, hopefully.

Rumor has it that this is our last week of work. We're supposed to head back to Denver next Tuesday so we can turn in our fire gear for the next class of wildfire teams. We actually may get to meet some of them on Friday because Chad asked for help with their field day after their wildfire classes. It's so strange that it's almost over. We've been doing this for so long that it had the feeling as though we would just continue. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with myself. I'll certainly miss the chainsaw. Cutting such a fun thing to do. Gosh. It's really almost over.

Tomorrow night, I hope to watch the rescheduled Phillies/Rays game and ... well, I won't jinx them. I just hope that the outcome is good, my city deserves it.