something crafty is in the works

I’ve been really into Eric B’s & Rakim’s Follow the Leader ablum for the past couple of days. It’s really good stuff … but then again, what do I know, I’m just another mid 20s white guy that likes hip-hop.

A lot of my friends ask me what I do at the Ranger Camp during the summer so I decided to put some slides about the Ranger Program online (openoffice2 format). I gave this presntation at the Ontario Minstry of Natural Resources Dryden District Staff Day on August 29th, 2005.

I also made a poster about the Rangers Program (openoffice2 format) that will be displayed at job fairs and such.

We dropped off the Rangers at the train station in Sioux Lookout last Thursday. On some level I’m happy that the summer is over because it’s been a really busy summer for me, but I’m not really looking forward to heading back to Toronto this year. Not sure what it is … oh well, at least I should have free time to do some coding. Hopefully school or work won’t distract me too much

I’m just chillin’ at the camp by myself right now. The cooks come in during the day to finish off their cleaning and I’m just finishing off my paper work. I could probably leave in a few days, but I’m just going to take my time and relax for the next week.

I had last week-end off so I decided to go on a mini solo canoe trip to Talking Falls. I got caught up with some admin type stuff at the camp so I didn’t hit the water until 4 PM Saturday. My plan was to hang out at the falls for the night and head back in the morning.

I was paddling against the current and into the wind with a white water canoe so I didn’t make as much progress as I wanted to. By the time 6:30 rolled around I was only at the top of Pinaemodi Lake (the X on the map) and the wind had picked up a bit.

It was at this point I realised that I wasn’t going to make it to Talking Falls that evening and with the prospect of setting up my tent on some random chunk of the river bank, I decided to turn around. Paddling with the current and wind put me back at the highway an hour later. I was a little dissappointed that I couldn’t spend the night out in the woods, but I still enjoyed the paddle. I think that I’ll give it a whirl again later this summer, but next time I’ll leave earlier.

I’ve been at the Ranger Camp for about a month now and it’s totally nice to be back. The only thing that really annoys me is the internet situation. Bell Canada decided to drop their one-way satellite service a few months ago which leaves me with a pile of useless electronics and a super low speed dial-up connection - don’t mess around 19.2 Kbps. The reason it’s so low is because the nearest service provider is 120 kms away. Ignace has a “wireless DSL” service, but it’s line-of-sight and there’s a big hill between the tower and the camp - I was really disappointed when technician told me the bad news. Hopefully they will upgrade the tower in the next couple of years to get better range. Anyway, enough techno-talk, here’s a picture of the camp.

The Rangers arrived about 2 weeks ago and I’ve been super busy organizing the schedule and dealing with a few issues that seem to accompany the arrival 0f 23 - 17 year old boys. Good times I tell ya :D.