Arizona ACE, Week 6

Carnage. Absolute carnage. 

That’s how our British friend Adam described his trip to Las Vegas a few weeks back.  This weekend was Spring Break for Americorps, so a bunch of us (12 americorps-ers, from 3 different teams + 8 of our European friends from ACE) went to Vegas for some carnage of our own.  

We also took a day trip to the Hoover dam for a dam tour and some dam pictures.  All in all, a dam good weekend.

In other news, we found out what our next (and last (!!!)) Americorps project is going to be.  And we got another winner.  We’ll be returning to Colorado, this time a few miles outside of Denver: to Boulder.  The work is going to be conservation (like our current AZ project), so building trails and working outside.  For the first half of the project, we’ll be living and working in Boulder.  The second half, we’ll be camping and working week-long stints all around Colorado.  I’m not entirely sure what to expect from next round, but I’m really excited to be in Colorado for the summer.  Lots of sun, concerts, baseball games, and hiking.  Up until that starts, we’ve got one last hitch, once again at Lake Mead doing fencing. 

Then it’s time to make like a tree and leaf. 

Time to make like a ball and bounce.    

Time to make like a banana and split.
Time to make like a baby and head out.
Okay, I'm done now...
...

...Time to make like a bowel and move.  

Arizona ACE, Week 5

Well, we made it through the budget cuts!  I think.  They passed a budget for the rest of the year, and we didn’t get sent home yet, so that’s good news.  Right? The $38.5 billion that was cut hit other programs, so Americorps is safe for the rest of the year.  The EPA took a big hit, which will show all those snobby trees and plants. Your free ride stops here, environment.

Anyway, with our jobs secure, we returned to work. This time we were doing fencing at Lake Mead (which is the lake that the Hoover Dam holds back).  It was a vastly different experience than our time in Hack Canyon.  We stayed at a campground (with showers! And water!) and our group was much bigger (37 people instead of 14).  The first few days, we did mostly hauling; carrying t-posts, cement, and wire to the fence. 2 miles through the desert.

The goal was to build a big barbed wire fence to keep out cattle, but I have no idea what kind of cow would ever want to live here.  Most of the green out there was cacti and the temperature was in the 80’s and 90’s the whole week.  Also, there were plenty of these guys around:

The back half of the week, four of us were put in charge of running the pionjar (pronounced: poon-jar).  The pionjar is a gas-powered jack-hammer and we needed it to drill holes for the t-posts into rocky sections.  The first two days, the pionjars we brought out to the rocks didn’t work, so we did a lot more repairs and struggling against the pull-cord than we did actual drilling.  By the end of the week, our 37 man crew had pounded posts along 2.5 miles of fence and strung wire a mile and a half.  We, meanwhile, had drilled 22 holes. Or about 150 yards.  Accomplishments!

One more hitch with ACE (likely an encore at Lake Mead) and then our time in Arizona is over.  That means that our Americorps year is almost ¾ finished. I’m starting to hear the fat lady.  She’s warming up for her aria.

Arizona ACE, Week 4

No new budget news, but we did make a trip the Grand Canyon this Sunday/Monday and it deserved its own update.  We're on break from ACE until Wednesday, and we lucked into a reservation at Phantom Ranch at the bottom of the canyon for Sunday night (some combination of snowy weather at the top and fears of the park shutting down during the budget drama).

We hiked down South Kaibab trail (6.3 miles) on Sunday.  We took alot of pictures, so I'll let the them do the talking:

Monday, we hiked back up Bright Angel trail (9.5 miles).  With an elevation change of almost a mile, Monday was a beast of a hike.

There's more pictures from our hike and our time in Arizona here. 

Fingers crossed for Americorps during the budget cuts this Thursday!

Arizona ACE, Week 3

What a weird week.  We dodged a bullet (federal shutdown) but we dodged our way into a bear cave (big budget cuts). And we’re wearing a meat suit.  And an “I hate bears” t-shirt. If Americorps is to exist at all by this Friday, we better hope the bear is hibernating.  (This metaphor got weird.)

The threat of a government shutdown came and went on Friday.  Americorps is a federally funded program, making me one of the 800,000 employees who would have been furloughed (put on unpaid leave).  Congress came to an agreement with less than an hour left before the current budget extension was set to expire.  By that point we had packed all our things here in Flagstaff and made plans for a return trip to Denver.  (A furlough would have meant staying in the dorms with no pay and nothing to do. Spendover! Super fun!)

Friday’s extension carries our funding through Thursday, but another $38 billion is set to be slashed, and it is entirely possible that Americorps will get cut.  I guess it’s nice to have avoided furlough, but getting fired by my country would suck worse.  Do I get a pink slip or is it star-spangled? 

C’mon Christracker, cheer up.

At this point, we have no control over what happens this coming week.  They tell us we’re going on hitch to do fencing Wednesday, but at this point, who knows.  Our last hitch got cancelled because of looming budget concerns, and even if we still have jobs come Thursday, this hitch could be canceled for money reasons too.

Anyway... Enough of that sad-sack eeyore budget bullshit. Here’s some pretty postcards!

Thanks to Patrick and Anna from Water 7 for this one.  It’s Clinton’s cat, just hardballin’ the press.

This one comes from Nick Ptacek up in Seattle

Also, I got this one from my Aunt Barb for my birthday.

Hey Tea Party: what up