As of yesterday afternoon, Whitewater-Baldy is 87% contained and fire activity has decreased to a point where there will no longer be any more updates on the fire.  The post-fire assessment is also complete, at least from a soils standpoint.  I took some pictures of the fire while we were still camped to the West of it, at Pueblo Park Campground near Reserve and Glenwood.  It was cool looking.

That was a while ago.  I can no longer see nor smell the fire when I'm down in the Gila.  This is probably a good thing.  I can't believe it's already been over seven weeks since I began the field season.  That is ridiculous.  Last year at this time, well... we all know what happened last year.  This year, since 4th of July is on a Wednesday, I won't be going out to the field next week.  Yay!  I was hoping to go to Michigan, but that didn't really work out, so I'm thinking of just not going to work very much next week.  At first I thought I didn't have very much leave, but then I heard another girl say she only had 37 hours of leave.  And I thought, I have WAY more than that!  I should totally just take some time off.  So, that's what I'm going to do.  Because work is kinda stressing me out right now.  I might go camping for part of the time, but honestly, all I really want to do is go shopping and swimming and work on my scrapbooks.  Oh, and read.  I found The Brothers Karamazov on the bookshelf at work yesterday and got super excited.  Russian literature is pretty much always awesome.  I also have a strong desire to go to the library and look up books on ancient Chinese art and culture, because I think that would be fun.  But alas, much of today was spent running errands.  There is not enough time to do all the things I want to do.  I need a month long vacation, like right now.  Or just a bunch of mini vacations over the next several months.  I might actually be able to swing that one.  We'll see...

In case you live under a rock somewhere (unless that rock is in the Gila), there's a giant fire burning right now.  It's called the Whitewater-Baldy.  It's like 280,000 acres or something ridiculous like that.  Meanwhile, I've been doing field work, in the Gila, for about a month now.  We started work near the fabulous Truth or Consequences.  Then the fire started dropping ash from the sky so we decided to leave there and go somewhere else.  But first, here's a little bit about what happened in the first two weeks (or what I can remember of it).

The first week, we planned to camp at a little fire base called Beaverhead.  It's not as nice as Negrito, but it's ok.  The main thing we didn't like about it was there were a lot more firefighters there all the time, and we kind of wanted to not be around a bunch of other people, because we're antisocial like that.  The first night, it was just J and me, so we decided to find some random spot to camp after driving around all day.  This is what we came up with.

The next day, we went back to Beaverhead because we had to meet our coworker from Silver City, so we moved camp.

This is our crappy work tent that I don't like putting up.  It also has a broken pole.

And this is a random swing.  Yep.

My boss bought a new tent this year, for us to all hang out in or something when it rains.  It's really big.  We call it the circus tent.  We had to put it up and test it out the first week.  The guys don't like it.  I'm pretty much indifferent to it.

In the circus tent, not paying attention to the photographer

The second week, the smoke came and turned the sun red.

Ok, so I took this on my phone which is why the color sucks, but the sun was red, and it was not cloudy.  That is smoke.

The smoke affected all of us, but it hit the guys harder than me.  They felt like crap pretty much the whole time.  And that is why we moved the next week, to the west side of the fire, in hopes that it wouldn't be quite as smoky.  For the most part, it really hasn't been, so that's good.  But I've learned that it wouldn't be field season without some sort of issue(s).  Especially when I'm involved, it seems.  I'm still trying to decide if I want to write about that.  I might not.

There is a lot I need to post about.  Garden progress, field work, the giant fire in the Gila...  Right now, I will say that, despite my fire training, I will not be working on the current fire.  Instead, I have to be around to give our seasonal employee something to do.  I'm not blaming her.  I think she's awesome, and super smart.  But I am slightly resentful.  It's like it was planned that way on purpose.  Oh, well.  On the bright side, I am now enjoying my weekend off instead of spending my Saturday riding down to Silver City with my boss listening to Rush Limbaugh.  Blah.

Anyway, Chloe made a post and asked some questions, so I will answer them.

1. What is your favorite hobby?  Writing.  I try to write in my personal journal at least several times a week.  And I also want to start writing some less private/angst-ridden things, that could potentially get published some day.  Also, scrapbooking.  Sometimes I daydream about my scrapbooks...

2. Be honest: do you like your in-laws? Why/why not?  I like them a lot more now that they live in Kansas!  Haha.  No, really, they're not too bad.


3. What is your biggest dream?  Honestly, just to be successful, and to be happy doing what I love.  To have long-lasting meaningful friendships, and a relationship based on respect and trust.

4. What do you think about marriage?  I would like to be married, someday.  That's really my only opinion on it at the moment.

5. Babies: yes or no? How many?  Right now, we have a strict "no waaah" policy.  But in the long run, I'm not sure.

6. Any allergies?  I'm allergic to some random medications, including sulfa drugs and robitussin.  Also, the not being able to eat avocado thing.

7. What is your biggest fear?  Failure, and not being able to do or get what I want out of life because of that fear.

8. Would you like to be a working mom or SAHM?  Since I'm not sure I even want to be a mom, I'll go with working.

9. What is taboo for you?  Not much.  When you spend all your time camping with two guys, that kind of stuff pretty much goes out the window.

10. How much do spend in clothes every month?  I hardly ever spend money on clothes for myself.  My last time clothes shopping I used gift cards from Christmas.

11. Airplane, cruise, car or train?  I would take any of those methods of transportation, but for some reason, I really want to take a train somewhere.  The train station is right next to my office, and sometimes I imagine leaving work, getting on the train, and just going...