2/4/2010

2/4/2010
Thursday. Our last day of working in the Comanche grasslands. Tomorrow, after a hike up to see the “zoo keeper” rock paintings we are going to travel back to Lake George. And welcome Liz and Noel to our team.

We had independent PT again today. After hiking for an hour I returned to our house and went out to the yard. I practiced the taekwon-do pattern Eui-Am. It needs a lot of work. L During my hike I took a couple of pictures, which I hope to post online tomorrow (along with these blog entries). It is sooo beautiful here. I love the area, the land, the work. The only thing that makes me long for another location is the lack of cell phone service, and to a lesser extent: internet.

We returned to the bank of the river to kill more tamarisk trees. We finished the whole side of the bank we were working on. It was amazing. At our AAR (after action review) Russ told us that it wasn’t expected that we get even that much done. Not bad for less than three days worth of work!

I have three highlights for today:
1. When driving to the worksite we played Lady Gaga using Brendan’s ipod. I was sitting in the backseat, behind Alex (who looks like a hardcore mountain man). I had a perfect view of him in the side view mirror. Watching him sing “ra ra ah ah ah, roma roma ma, ga ga ooh la la” made me burst out laughing every time his lips moved. Lady Gaga is the singer of our team. Every one sings along (except Jeremy), and she is the topic of conversation, at least once a day.
2. Close to the end of the day Josh picked up a chainsaw. Marshall had just refilled the gas and did not close the tank. Josh spilled gasoline all over his lower extremities. Specifically some very sensitive man parts. Apparently gasoline burns sensitive man parts. Josh spent a long time, and a great deal of water trying to stop the burning. And eventually used his neck wrap to cover and cushion said area. (My apologies for finding joy in your pain).
3. I sawed for a long time today (longer than ever before!) and I didn’t feel as tired, or as muscle fatigued as usual. And I wore my fire pack all day. AND we finished the project we came to do. We had originally packed up our equipment and loaded the van at around 3. However once Russ saw how much was left to be done he had us unload and finish the task. He and Strifler sawed the remaining trees and our team swamped all they cut. It was done in less than half an hour!