Two days off.

By Saturday night, Lakeview can tend to start filling me with the dread of Sunday. Lakeview isn't a bad place if your out of town working 12+ hours per day. But having to spend your day off in this town can be really depressing. You can judge for yourself based on this picture of downtown that I took last Sunday. I'm sure a lot of people love this town. Not me.

You can always click on the pics to make them bigger.



So Saturday after work I didn't waste any time on washing my truck before I drove the 3 and a half hours North West to Bend.



Bend, Oregon is one of my favorite cities in the country. I seriously love this town. Its a bit pricey and it is really hard to find a job here because the main industry I believe is tourism. But every time I come here, I get the vibe that this is a place that I could easily call home and be 100% happy with that decision. Rebecca has yet to visit Bend, but I am kinda thinking she is gonna feel the same way. Unfortunately for some reason I don't have any snazzy pictures of Bend, I will work on that tomorrow. I did take a picture of some Geese that I saw on my run this morning.




Being that this is a holiday weekend, Bend is packed full of people right now. On the way back from my run, I stopped at The Crepe Place.
On a typical Sunday morning, I order, they make my Crepes and I leave. Today there was a pretty big line and it took over 30 minutes. It was a little embarrassing because I was wearing running cloths and I was drenched in sweat but I think people around here are used to seeing that though because it seems like this is the land of the uber fit. After getting my order (it is worth the wait!) I walked next door to Starbucks to get myself 2 large coffees. No, one isn't enough. The line was out the door! Bend really gets a ton of people coming in for holidays I guess.

I did make a wonderful discovery today. Bend has an outdoor Olympic 50 Meter swimming pool!! It should go without saying that after I finished my breakfast I headed straight for the pool. It was nice to get in the water. Its been about a month since I last swam and I could really feel it. I'm gonna try and get here every Sunday, at least until I end up at the Camp. That way, I can possibly maintain a shred of fitness.

Since I now know for certain that it will be several months before the camp will be built in Vya, Nevada I am moving from a hotel in to a house. Housing in Lakeview is very hard to come by given that its a small town and it only has a couple of motels. A lot of people are trying to figure out ways to make money off of this pipeline project which is going to bring approximately 800 workers to their small town. I found an older couple that is renting out two rooms at their house. They own a small restaurant in town, and they raised 6 children so I think I will be fairly comfortable living there. I talked to them for a little while and they seem really nice. Its about $1200 a month cheaper than the hotel I was staying at, so hopefully its a win win for everyone. It will be a little weird, but I guess I will get used to it. I will just be waiting for Saturday night to roll around so that I can head back to Bend!


By the way, I saw that train wreck again on Thursday, still there but with a fresh coat of snow!

Inspiration.

This morning I thought I was in the middle of nowhere. I took a picture of the last sign that I passed. It wasn't referring to the direction that I was heading. If it were, it would have said "No services next 200 miles" I was heading in the direction of Winnemucca, 200 miles East but the sign referred to Gerlach, which was 100 miles South.



Sometimes, when you think you are in the middle of nowhere, a shark jumps out at you. I was kind of looking around thinking to myself that probably very few people have been here

and THEN...




I guess I wasn't too surprised. It's very hard to find anything in nature that hasn't in some way been touched by man. It is pretty cool looking, and the fact that it is where it is adds to its charm. Its probably 20' tall, so whowever did it put in some time.


I did see something that was a little more interesting this afternoon.



I haven't seen a derailed train before. I don't know why they left it laying there. I guess out here it is just too much trouble for them to clean up.


So I did it. I hope this will inspire me to actually start posting with some regularity. My goal is every Sunday. I think its a good way to sort of keep in touch. I have no idea what communication will be like when I get to the camp. Right now I am using a satellite phone for the majority of the area on this project, but I have heard talk of installing some sort of cell tower at the camp. But nothing is for sure. No one even knows when the camps will start being built for sure. No one even knows when this project is going to start for sure. The only thing I know for sure is that I am going to be here for a long time.

The Runner

The last few days on my double digit below zero temperature runs I have been thinking a lot about what drives me to do the things I do, what makes me the way I am, why I am motivated by certain things. Now I am not trying to get deep here but I am just thinking, and wondering about this song.

Manfred Mann - The Runner


I remember as a little kid that I actually taped this song off of the radio (you guys remember doing that right?) and it was one of my favorite songs. This was long before I ever started running. I still love the song to this day and it is one of my favorite songs to listen to while running. I know the video is pretty sick, but it was the early 80's and I guess that was cool then. I just wonder if this song has had an actual subconscious influence on me?

I mean what if I had taken a liking to this song instead

Weird Al Yankovic - Eat it

Would I have turned out different?? I think maybe....

If simple things like this do by chance have a life long influence over us, whats gonna happen to the video game kids of today??

excited about christmas break!!

So.. Rebecca and I both have time off from December 25th through January 5th and I can't wait.

We have absolutely nothing planned except that we are not going to be visiting our families.

Sorry family.

Its been a long time since we have really been able to spend a good deal of time together without anything else going on. We were considering planning a vacation, but we kinda backed out on that idea. There are some things that we can do around the house, plus I think I've probably spent 340 nights in a hotel already this year, and I really prefer my own bed.

However if we do get the urge to fly to San Francisco to climb hills and eat dinner or down to Savannah to eat Beignets on River street we will probably do it.... Thats how a life of temporarily having no responsibilities should be.

It was 27 below zero this morning. Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer!! It is actually supposed to get above zero, that wasn't supposed to happen until Friday but I am happy that its coming a little sooner. I kind of wussed out the past couple of days and went to the YMCA to run rather then back out into the cold after having spent the day tramping through the forest in 2 feet of snow. I'm sure I'm not alone in despising treadmills, I usually only run on them a few times a year because I pride myself in running outside regardless of the weather and now I remember why. First I hate not going anywhere. Second its really hot because there is no wind resistance and Third I sorta wonder if people think that I'm weird or showing off because everyone else is either walking or maybe getting on and running for 5 or 10 minutes. I don't feel like I can run like I want to. I just feel out of place I guess, Running is supposed to make me free from everything. I want to run and not be restrained by the "dreadmill". So ya, I'm just gonna save the treadmill for double digit below zero days!

Todays Random animal picture.
A Funny looking goat.

Sorry bout the lapse!

Wow, hard to believe its been over a month since the last time that I posted. Being back in Minneapolis, time goes a bit quicker. I've been pretty busy since coming back from out West, dinking around with my house and what not. I've been to Michigan 3 times in the last month, its been good to see my family. Now I am just ready to stay home for awhile. Hopefully starting next weekend I will be able to. I think Rebecca is getting a little sad thinking that I was gonna be home for awhile, but still ending up out of town most of the time.

At the moment I'm on the road again working in Northern Minnesota sitting in a hotel room and sorta figuring out a preliminary racing schedule for next year. Its kind of complicated because I really don't know where I'm gonna be at a particular time of year, so it's more of a wish list of races I want to do and then sorta wait and see what happens. I know I will do the Lifetime fitness triathlon. And my "A" running race for next year will be the Xterra trail run Nationals . I really want to do the Steelhead Half Ironman as well, but that is only 2 weeks after the lifetime triathlon, so it really depends on where I am working as to whether or not I will be able to get back for that. On top of those, there are a bunch of other races on my wish list including a bunch of small local races that I would like to do.

My running has been going pretty good, and I'm happy with the progress that I have made over the last year. I am really excited that I have gotten back in to trail running, I haven't been injured since last January so I'm gonna knock on wood and hope it stays that way. I'm gonna hit the pool hard over the next 3 months now that I am in town and see what I can do in the water. I guess as far as the bike goes, haha!! Serious riding outside this time of year in Minnesota is fairly dangerous, so I'm looking forward to more spin classes and a lot of time on the trainer.

Oh- a cool story. Yesterday while working I saved a fox!! I found a fox that had been caught in a snare, the wire was wrapped around his neck and there was no way that the poor guy could get out. I think he had probably gotten caught yesterday morning because he was in really good shape and didn't appear to have any injuries other than the snare around his neck. I was wearing thick leather mittens and thick boots and clothes so I wasn't too scared of being bitten, and with the help of my crew I managed to pin him down and use my leatherman to cut the snare off of the tree and then slide it off of his neck and release him unharmed!!

Anyways-
We got a pretty decent storm today and tomorrow the temperature is supposed to drop to 41 below zero, actual air temp! thats not including wind chill. I can't wait. After working out in it all day, if I still have fingers and toes I am considering going for a run in it...

The Beauty of the Section Corner..

I suppose that maybe it is only something that a boundary surveyor can appreciate.. But this is essentially what my job boils down to.

(the pix are prettier if you click on them!!!)

Finding section corners.

Our entire country is divided up in to one mile squares. And at the corners of these squares are section corners.

Surveying is a profession that is far from most peoples minds. But it is impossible to overstate the affect that it has had on our country.

This corner was on top of a mountain, the surveyor that originally placed it there had no way to drill in to the rock. So he piled stones around it to hold it in place. It has been that way for about 100 years.

I often find myself wondering about the original surveyors of this land. My job is to retrace their footsteps.

I wonder how they did it. They were away from home for maybe years at a time.

I wonder about their family, whether or not they were married. They didn't have phones in the 1800's when most of this was originally surveyed. Did they just get an occasional letter from home when they got near a town??

It must have been a tough life. I sometimes think that my job is tough, but I know it isn't. Not compared to what the original surveyors must have went through. They lived in tents or slept under the stars. This is not a forgiving land. I am sure that death was common.

I often wonder why they did it. Look at these pictures. There is nothing around for literally hundreds of miles. I often wonder why I do it. Does my job even make any sense? I know the answer. I love surveying. I feel that it is one of the greatest jobs that a man could be lucky enough to have, although I am often not sure that it makes any sense.

I hope that from looking at these pictures you not only get an idea of the vastness and loneliness of the thousands of miles of uninhabited landscape that I see, but you also begin to understand what I consider beautiful about my job.

Some pix n stuff from the past week.

I have been busy as usual the past week. I put in 164 hours last pay period (2 weeks). So I really don't have a lot to say because all I do is work and run.

Today I was working in Nevada and look what I saw.

This is my friend wild horse!!

After we stared at each other for about 20 seconds, he decided that he had somewhere else to be. He stopped for one last look before disappearing over the hill. I doubt that he has seen very many other humans. This is near Massacre Ranch, which is about 190 miles North West of Winnemucca, Nevada. The nearest town.

I think that this is the only building left standing at Massacre ranch. There are numerous foundations and trails and other antique oddities. Its very eerie and kind of scary, given the name and the remoteness.

This is a forest fire that I saw near Bly, Oregon on Saturday. I think that it had just started earlier that day, because usually they are a lot smokier if they have been burning for awhile.

Random trail shot. This is a gorgeous trail.
I LOVE TRAIL RUNNING!!!!!