Getting the Job of all Jobs...

Well, I'm freakin blogging... You can thank Caroline for this :)

So, as many of you already know, I hate sitting at my desk. I even wrote a book once that was inspired from my misery of desk-sitting, "Quarter Life Crisis". Not much has come from the book as of yet, but my drive to leave my desk has not faltered one tiny bit... Over the last few years I have researched making a move to all sorts of places... Thailand, Charleston, St. Croix Tibet, Colorado, West Virginia, etc... And as time passed, all places turned out to lack job opportunities that interested me... Except for one, Wild and Wonderful West Virginia :)

For the past 4 years I have gotten a group together in September for my birthday to head out to West Virginia to raft two of their rivers. One being the New River, which is a fun river with a good handful of adrenaline heightening rapids, and a few jumpable cliffs. The second being The Gauley. The Upper Gauley is the second most difficult river in the western hemisphere, or northern america, or something like that. All I know is that it's legendary for it's gnarley-ness, and it's scary as crap. There are countless Class IV and Class V rapids, with one Class VI 12ft waterfall at the end, that they have downgraded to a Class V so they can take commercial boats down it... Commercial boats that I will now be guiding :) Holy hell...

About a month ago I headed out to Colorado to hang out with a friend of mine who guides in WV, and do some snowboarding... Colorado is an amazing place because every square foot of it is rideable, out in the Rockies at least... And of course, I fell in love with the atmosphere of it all. Cool people my age working as snowmobile guides, snowboarding instructors, dog sledders, bartenders, etc... all outside all the time riding and loving every moment of it all. So, I researched moving out there in the summer because they have 4 rivers that seemed decent, and their summers are just as fun ans busy as their winters. But as time went on, it became more clear to me that the job opportunities were not abundant, especially for someone who had never even run those rivers before. So, out of pure curiosity I applied for a Rafting Guide position in WV instead. I picked a company that I knew was really big with the failing economy in mind, and filled out an application. I told them I'd been running their rivers for 4 years, that last year I took the helm to guide a few rapids on my own (small ones), and that I was used to customer service considering I'd been a server/bartender for 5 years. They said I was "A Perfect Candidate", and I've never smiled so big :)

So it's official, I start training with ACE Rafting Company on March 21st, which will be cold as balls. As I was reading their "What to Expect" letter, I remember being thrown back the most at this line "...you may want to bring a wool sweater, wool socks and a wool hat to wear under your wetsuit and helmet, because there are few things more miserable than being cold and wet..." Super... I'm going to freeze to death. At least they let us sleep in some heated cabins for a few weeks until we're ultimately kicked out and relocated to the Guide Camps, where I will proceed to live in a tent from April to October :) They said it's like a cool little community, where people all take turns cooking and everyone really likes it. I think I'm going to love it...

So from now until March 20th, I will continue to work for my Dad at TCG, and I will start collecting the items I'm going to need to survive... And that's a literal statement, sweet huh? Expect to hear about Going Away Parties... Because I'm going to throw a few before I go to be able to say goodbye to all my favorites...