Party Times at the P-Tic

So a couple days ago we decided that, rather than spending our ten days off desperately trying to amuse ourselves in Prince George, we would take a bus south to the Okanagan, find a campsite close to a beach, and float down the river in an air mattress - and yesterday I did exactly that. I currently reside in the Happy Hour campsite, a decrepit but cozy trailer/tent park complete with a myriad of trailer trash characters who are to kind for their own good. We're (Cody, Dan, Charlie, Ben and I) all having a blast so far in the beautiful town of Penticton. This morning I woke up, and took a morning dip in a beach surrounded by enormous desert like mountains - it's surreal. Oh and did I mention that about four hot girls are in the campsite next to us? Ahhhhhh this is the life. It's hot and sunny (yesterday it was 40 degrees celsius) and breezy enough to keep me sane. It's simply great. Anyway, I'll have more short little updates on this vacation in the coming days - that is if I'm still sober after Canada day :)

Peace and Sunshine,
James The Music Man

See Ya Later, West Fraser!

Apparently blogger was under maintenance for like the last two weeks, but it seems to have revived itself for temporary usage.

So June has been flying by my face like a mosquito who recently dined on a dish of redbull, and trees are flying into the ground at furious speeds. I'll try and give you the lowdown on the past two shifts, although my somewhat hungover medulla oblongata may not perform to it's fullest capacity. But I digress - we had one shift of non stop rain, which proved to be quite frustrating and morale-crushing. Next shift was also non stop rain, with the odd patch of sun here and there. We planted 13 cent mounds, which was a nice break from the impossible-to-space inclined obstacle planting. My best day was 1600 trees, which was ok.

We have two more days 'till this perilous contract expires, and then I have - smiles at the thought - TEN DAYS OFF! Booyakasha! So I'm chilling in quesnel right now and - what the? 3 minutes left? Man I take forever! I'll have to finish this later.. guh

TO BE CONTINUED.. ISH

Slash, Mountains, Noseeums, and an Update

Ahhh summer... The sweet sweet joys of sweat-drenched heat, malignant amounts of parisitic flying insects, and Celtic's new contract in Quesnel, B.C. That's right - we've packed up camp and moved further north, into the scenic mountainous country of Quesnel. Our campsite? a miniature gravel quarry amidst specks of forest. It's nothing special, but it has it's quirks. Such as sliding down the steep and loose slope to breakfast, all the while half awake and carrying a coleman. Another one of the complimentary tidbits that our new campsite has to offer is the dredged "noseeums". Think fruit-flies that bite. These lil' buggers are everywhere, and have turned my legs, hands, arms, and face into a lumpy terrain reminiscent of the badlands in Caledon. Nothing like a few hundred itchy souvenirs! But enough of my whining...

This past shift has been a little slow, simply due to the fact that we have had to get used a few crazy changes in both the land and the way our trees must be planted. Rather than the spacey six trees per plot (ie six trees in a circle with a radius of roughly four metres), we've had to adapt to the claustrophobic nine trees per plot. This, however, is rather nice - because you only have to take a couple of steps now to plant your next tree, aside from the previous six. But the real kicker of the new contract is the land. Take zero notice to any of my previous complaints about the Canfor land, because this stuff is the cream of the shit. I've had to plant in slash higher than my head, all continuously uphill at an incline worthy of a triple black diamond ski hill (if they exist). It's ridiculously frustrating when you're trying to space off of one of your trees, and in your path you have a patch slash 10 x 10 metres in your way. The job has literally transformed into a crossbreed of mountain climbing and awkward circus position planting. But it all adds to the adventure, and the scenery.. oh the scenery.. all makes up for it. When your trudging up that slope, barely hanging on with your life by a couple of dead pine branches, and on the horizon you see snow peaked mountains and grassy knolls - it makes you feel like a crazy tree planting hobbit in Middle Earth. I shall have to charge my camera and give you a video tour.

Our crew has seen a couple new faces, one of which, Paul, decided to depart back to the city life after a meager three days of easy-peasy planting.. ahh city folk. The other, Charlie, or "Chocolat Chaud" (pronounced 'Shaw-kaw-lah show'd) - a funny P.E.Islander who cannot pronounce most french words properly. I sorta feel like a vet - especially when these guys complain how hard it was to plant six-hundred trees in a 9 hour day. Heheh it's a nice feeling.

There was a brief and frightening period where I thought my ipod had been stolen. I thought I had left it on the dash in the black truck that we drive around in everywhere, and then a couple days after we set up camp I realized that it wasn't there. I felt pretty sick to my stomach with it's loss, and I could not sleep for a couple of nights. I prayed for it to be found, and like a miracle - the next morning, I spotted a headphone wire.. sandwhiched within "The Curious Incident Of The Dog At Nighttime" - an excellent book. I pulled it out with glee, like a child unwrapping their ipod's at christmas, and there it was - the J-pod, in all it's glory. I kissed it and cuddled with it, and the velvetine rabbit of my generation was found.

So to sum up, I'm still adjusting to the new contract, but things are looking good. I'll be 19 in roughly 18 days, and I'll be home in roughly a month and a half. My frullet has reached greater lengths than I've ever seen before, and my bespeckled face has grown weathered with wind, dirt, and adventure. I'm always happy that I'm not stuck at some low end job in Georgetown, or in some office (even if it's air-conditioned), because my office is the great outdoors, and my water cooler - a leaky 10 litre Coleman. It truly is a kick-ass job.

Anywhodiddly, I plan on spending the rest of the day perhaps at the pool, or looking at the mac computers at the London Drugs complex (yes I know.. I'm a geek through and through). My enrolment appointment to choose my courses at York is coming up, and I pretty much have most of it figured out - I just need to organize my timetable. I sure hope everybody's summer has been as interesting as mine thus far (or Katie and Mel's.. mmm dried lizards), and I can't wait to see y'all again come August!

peace and love,
Screef Mcjones.. err I mean James.

Dayofftastic

Well well well. A belly full of wendy's, a mat of hair full of rain, and a head full of relaxation and tingling remnants of alcohol - and I feel fine.

This past shift was pretty decent. Not overly decent, but definitely decent-ish. I've had to crackdown on my quality, apparently a tiny shovel slit the size of a fingernail qualifies as a frost pocket, or an "open hole", and thus I have had to spend an extra 5-10 seconds squeezing them shut. As a result of this, I have been planting perfect trees.. ever so slowly. Yet I still managed to break a thou every day, so I'm not too disappointed.

My last piece was fun - steep uphill slash almost a metre thick, where planting one tree requires a complete 5 minute excavation of trees, logs, twigs, and moss. Lots of sweaty fun, nonetheless. Speaking of which, we threw an emergency dance party last night in camp, which was amusing and quite humourous. I got my jig on to some swinging beats all night long. Yet now I suffer the consequences with cramps in various parts of my body - most likely karma doing it's deed for sloppy dance moves.

So Kirsten left our crew to go chill with her boyfriend whom is planting at a different company, about 4 people in our crew have tendonitis, and thus only Levi, Cody, and I have been pounding trees. I often wonder who will be left by the end of the season - in fact, I think this would make a fox-worthy reality series. You could call it "Last Planter Screefin'" or something like that. Man that would be entertaining.

So I promised you pictures, however I cannot find Katie and her digital camera - so the pictures shall have to wait. To compensate, I'll give you a vivid description of what I currently look like. Lets see, wild scraggly curly fro with the odd twig nestled within, drool stains here and hither on my face, dirty eyebrows and sanchez moustache - in fact I look quite reminiscent of an illegal border hopping mexican immigrant - not to be stereotypical, but seriously - I do! Then there's the dirt-in-nail cut up fingers, the stark contrasting watch tan, and stained pants. Yep, a real beaut.

Heheh, anyway - I've been trying to figure out which courses I'm going to take.. and the lists are humongous.. It shall take some time, but I've already found a few which look really cool. For instance, Life off of earth - which is a science course all about how life could subsist on crazy planets like mars. Lots of cool stuff to choose.. gah it's too much.

Well, that's it for this week - I will try and get some photos up, so stay snappy!

later,
J-root Macduff