What have I been up to lately? Plenty…

I just finished up the latest TLDTV video: Mountain Biking Chadwick’s Motorcycle and ATV Use Area. It
was a great project, and a lot of fun to make, not to mention how much fun it
was actually riding the trails and filming it! Be sure to check it out, along
with all our other videos found in the “Media: TLDTV” section.

Two days ago I got signed up officially with the BLM/Forest
Service fire dispatch in western Colorado, so now I have to keep my phone
closer than ever (something I don’t especially enjoy). I’m basically on-call
right now, so when the full-time crew needs some help, I’ll be ready. They can
call me on duty for as little as a day, or as long as two weeks, with only an
hour or two notice.

I just picked up a pair of new firefighting boots yesterday,
so I’m excited to give those a try on my first fire. I also got some Obenauf
fire-resistant laces and fire-resistant leather oil that should help keep my
feet safe, and the boots in good condition. They certainly weren’t as cheap as
I was hoping, but with my feet done growing, I thought it would be a good idea
to go ahead and invest in a pair that will last for a long time.

The campground where we’re at (classified information until
we leave – TLD policy) has a nice weight room, so I’ve been trying to exercise
about an hour a day since we’ve been here. 10 miles on the bike (at maximum
difficulty setting), 300+ reps on the “rowing machine” (something I hear used
to be popular), and then some laps in the swimming pool (I can never seem to
keep count). Then, jump in the hot tub to finish it all off…

Lately we’ve been riding at some incredible places – one of
which literally took our breath away (it was over 13,000 feet high)!  I
have to commend Colorado, since they so far have the largest system of trails
and roads open to ATVs. In some places you can ride from town to town over the
mountains, or even into neighboring states. I feel like I could probably spend
a lifetime exploring the roads and trails here, and still not see everything.
More on our recent Colorado riding adventures will come soon!

We’ve also been doing a lot of rock-hounding lately, what
with being in one of the biggest gold and gem areas in America and all! So far,
no riches beyond comprehension, but we have found some pretty cool stuff. More
garnets than we could keep, bags of petrified wood, some cool fossilized sea
life, and lots of other awesome rocks that we have yet to identify. We also
found a very radioactive rock (something Colorado apparently has quite a bit of
to watch out for), that we promptly removed from the collection once I found it
in a rock identification book. Supposedly, there’s also gold in them there
hills (the ones I’m looking at right now), so we may try some gold panning this
weekend. Of course, the location where we found all the stuff mentioned above
is top-secret, so don’t even ask. =)

I’ve been working hard on my fourth Berean School of the
Bible course – trying to get it completed by September 1st. I only have 22 more
before I’ll be an ordained minister! A long way to go, but it’ll be worth every
minute I’ll have spent working on it and more. I’m looking forward to seeing
what God does through it in my life (although, personally, I’ve already learned
SO much).

So… what’s next? Hopefully some cooler weather, although I
can’t really complain since I’m sitting in about 30% humidity and 85 degrees,
while many of my friends are baking in 100 degree heat back in Missouri with
unspeakable humidity. And the nice thing about being in the mountains is, if it
starts getting too hot down in the valley, ride four or five miles up into the
mountains and there may be snow! No… you won’t be hearing any complaining from
me…