In the news

So I am sure you are all wondering where I am since the news of the big fire in Southern CA yesterday. Well I am here at home. We are on days off so we will see what happens. It is very sad to me that four people died trying to save a house. We are always told that it is just bushes and houses and to protect ourselves first. I can't say what happened to them but I wish they would have gotten out of there before the s#$t hit the fan, but yesterday was a sad day for us wildland firefighters. There is still one guy in critcal condition in the hospital. I hear that he has burns over 95% of his body. I am hoping that he survives but it is going to be a rough uphill battle. I am not sure if i was that burnt that I could make it.

Anyway here is my plug for the day. There is a wildland firefighters foundation so if anyone has a little extra money laying around that they would like to donate it is an excellent cause and they do more for wildland firefighters than anyone could ask of them.

Currently the offical layoff date is nov 2nd for the seasonals unless we go to a fire somewhere. So it is going to be somewhat of a busy week trying to get everything ready for the end of the season

The end is getting nearer.......

...........or so I hope. It is getting into late october and we have been in station for quite some time now. We are doing all sorts of little projects around the station but mostly I have been working on our end of the season slideshow so I have been going through all sorts of pictures picking out the best ones and putting them together into a slideshow.

Most likely the seasonals will have 2 weeks of work left or if the weather stays nice like it has been then there is a chance that it will be 3 more weeks for them plus 2 more for me. I am hoping it is sooner than later. there comes a point when you can only spend so much time in station. If we go to more fires great I will work till when ever there aren't any fires.... (well I should say till fire danger or the possiblity of doing perscribed burns end cuz there are no fires now) So basically we are all counting down the days although we don't really know when we will get laid off.

Here I am burning up a tree that has a marker on it saying that it is a wildlife tree and to not damage the tree. Opps!!!

In other news. my good friend Nick, who I have worked with the past few years is coming home. Nick took this season off to go to Iraq to be a contract firefighter. He has been on a military base near bagdad since june and was supposed to be there for a year, but for many reasons I ma not sure of all of them yet he has decided to come home. I am glad that he is coming back because it means that I wont have to worry about him as much.

Here is paul conducting a burn out operation. It is always fun to light things on fire especially when they burn up good like this fire was!

Snow

Well It snowed here yesterday. Just a little bit and it was all gone by early this morning. It was kind of a suprise because we didn't think that there was going to be a storm. and right now it is cold nad I think that my fingers are going to fall off.

Tommorow is friday for me. Yippee!!!

There are santa anna winds predicted in LA so that means there can be a high fire danger down there. so you never know. my fire season may not be over yet.

On Monday we went out to a fire that has been burning in the park for quite a while (it is one that they just monitor and let it do its thing) anyway I was excited because I got the chance to cut down a couple of pretty big trees. One was about 28 inches in diameter and the other one was 26in. My cuts were good so I was happy since it was the first time this year that I got the chance to cut anything really big.

The best part is that the saw that I was using had a 36 inch bar on it so with the power head of the saw it was close to 50in tall so that means it wasn't much smaller than me.

Here is a picture that I found....I don't think I was that happy that I was having my picture taken

My Weekend

Eventhough I had to work today I thought that I would write about my weekend. Lets see... Thursday night I ended up haning out with the folks that work on the engine here in the park. Normally they will come down and hangout with us but we went up to one of thier houses and ended up having a good night. We even ended up convincing jake to do a "hot lap" around the General Grant tree on the way home so that was fun.

Friday I headed down to fresno to get a couple of things that I needed hopefully I won't have to go back for a couple of weeks but we will see. Then friday night we watched a show on the history channel called into the fire that my boss was featured in. It was a pretty decent show talked mostly about structure bros but thats ok. While we were watching it we ended up having a little wine party...which was kind of weird cuz it was me and a handful of guys all drinking wine. My sis ter got there around 11:30 or maybe a little later and she got the chance to take the dust of her pool skills although she scratched on the 8 ball so my team won. Jake had a friend visiting also and she is a fire dancer so she danced for us....that was pretty cool.

Laura and I had planned on going for a hike yesterday but we woke up and it wasn't very nice out...but we still were all about it so we drove over to the trailhead and started to hike but soon discovered that tourist are crazy drivers and then after we started hiking the fog just kept getting thicker and thicker so we hiked for a while and then decided that it wasn't worth it cuz we couldnt see anything more than 5 feet in front of us. All in all we hike about 8 miles so not to bad. It was a fun night I even took her to the local pizza place so she saw the prize citizens of squaw valley.

Tomorrow is my dad's birthday so happy birthday dad!!!!

Toothless

Well Andrew has lost his front two theeth. I hear that the tooth fairy has visited him and brought him $3.oo. The tooth fairy must take inflation into account cuz idon't think that I made that much from her

Colombus day

Well today is colombus day and the only reason that I know that is because I got today off. Yes there is a good reason for federal holidays. Most of the time we work holidays so it was kind of unexpected to get today off, but that is what happens when the fire danger is low. so because we didn't have to work today we had a little gathering last night. It was a good evening. Except the amy that likes to kick people after she has had a couple of drinks came out. Yes I was introducing everyone to "my sidekick"


So I have mentioned that we have these crazy ravens where I live, and well they have been eating everyones wipers and other rubber things from peoples cars and well I thought I was safe. That it until I went to use my wiper yesterday.....those bastards ate my wiper..... But don't worry we have a plane to get rid of them and it may involve the use of a bebe gun

I have become addicted to grey's anatomy. I bought season two on DVD and I can't stop watching it.

Lastly here is a picture I found the other day.....it is me at the grand canyon with Brighty the mule.

Photos from the Day Fire

Well here are some of the photos that I took at the day fire. I hope that everyone enjoys them...I may post some on the blog not using the slide program for those of you who have slow internet connections.




Anyway no much else is new here. It has been a little chilly in the park and I am trying to guess when we will get our first snow. My guess is when we get the next storm

Jen had her baby

For all of you that know jen b, jen had a little girl on Sept 28. Her name is Carletta Ann. I must say that jen is on brave and couragous woman. She developed what is called help syndrome (very uncommon) and had to have her baby 2.5 weeks early.

I talked to jen today finally and i must say she has quite the story to tell about the arrival of her little girl. It even involved Jen getting a helicopter ride. But don't worry mom and baby are both at home and doing well.

Once again I must say congrats to jen. Love ya and miss ya. you are a champ!!!!!

A Few Photos from Oregon

Some may call me crazy

Well a bunch of us were talking about running a half-marathon in the begining of Nov and I have decided why the heck not. the best part is that I convinced my sister to do it with me. The funny thing is that since we haven't been in station much the past few months we haven't been running a lot. the good thing is that I did run 7 miles yesterday so that is good. Plus I train at 6500 feet when then half marathon which in Santa Barbara is at zero feet so that should give me an advantage.

The weather is getting wetter and cooler here so fire season is slowly ticking away so my training for hte half marathon may end up happening.

Also the ticker at the top of my page is an aproximate date that that seasonals will get laid off I will still have to work after that but I just like to think that the end is near

Back in Station and this time it may be for a while

Hey all. I am back in station. We put the Day fire out......well the 4000 other people probably helped some and I am pretty sure that the rain put the final touch on it.


Anyway we cam back on Oct2 which is a very important or should I say meaningful day to me. For those of you who don't know on 10/2/04 I lost a good friend of mine when an accident occured on the perscribed burn we were woking happened. Anyway Dan was an awesome person and eventhough I only knew him for a short time he touched my life in a way that I can never explain. He is missed by all and I know that I will always remeber oct 2 for the rest of my life.

It was pretty cool we came home on the anniversary and got to see dan's mom and bro, who I still in contact with and treasure as friends. We had a big old party that night...dan was one who liked to celbrate life so that was what we did.....fun was had by all... It was super good to see matt and dee.

Well I am off tommorow until sun but we are still available for fires so that means I can't go anywhere (sorry sis) I have a bunch of errands to run and computer catching up to do so I will finally get some more fire pictures and stories up