Some cool stuff has been happening. Tuesday night I went "camping" with some of the boys. In reality, I didn't sleep there, I HATE camping, but I did hang out with them and do camping stuff. I drove down with one of the boys and we drove forever and ever and couldn't find the place. So we turned around and it turns out we passed the site way in the beginning of the drive. We got to the camp site first, sorta. One of the boys had come earlier and set stuff up, but then he left. So we scavenged for wood and built a fire. Then the other two guys showed up after they finished working and we hung out.

I even shot a gun for the first time in my life! I remember way back in 4th grade Mrs Kramp .made all of us sign a pact saying we would never hold a gun in our lives. Well, I changed my mind. I still really don't like the idea of hunting, but we were just shooting at empty bottles. And I hit one! It was pretty cool. The guys, being guys, had a riot. They even brought a frisbee golf net, so they played that and I watched.

Then we just chilled by the fire. When it got really dark, me and the boy I drove with headed back to the ranch.

Recently there have been some pretty bad wildfires in Colorado. And they're having a really tough time containing it. So yesterday Grand County issued a fire ban, which pretty much ruins the entire summer. I LOVED hanging out at the fire near one of the boys cabins. Now, without a fire it's gonna be all buggy and dark and cold. So that really, really stinks. And everyone says they won't lift the ban until we get a bunch of rain, which probably won't be for a long. long time, like probably near the end of the season. It's such a bummer. I'm really upset. The ranch has permission to have fires for some reason, but staff is not allowed to start any. So basically no more camping for anyone.

Also, this morning at breakfast I overheard a few of the maintenance guys talking about fire evacuation plans. They talked about what we would do with the horses and if/when they would tell the guests. They were talking about their personal plans and how they have all their important documents gathered and stuff, so I passed along the info to a few of my friends and will probably put everything together tonight. But nobody has officially mentioned anything to the staff yet. So no need to worry too much yet.

Another thing. I've been becoming pretty good friends with a few of the girls here. Particularly two of the bartenders, Danielle and Juliette. We went out for drinks one night and Juliette and I played soccer with another girl one night. It's just that during my down time at the pool, I hang out by the patio bar so we're together a lot. Danielle is very nice, and she's the one I spend most time with. We did some errands today and she told me about how she went to boarding school, which was really interesting. And when Juliette and I played soccer, we went with one of the girls from the office, Cait. She played soccer in college and went to Aurora University so that's kinda near Chicago! Well the three of us were the only ones that showed up at soccer practice, because some people organized a team from the ranch to play in a league in town. But practice was fun. The only bad part was that Juliette had such a great kick on goal that I tried to block, so I just stuck my arm out to the side and the kick was so powerful that it forced my arm back and hyper-extended my elbow. So the next day it hurt a lot so I iced it, and it's almost better now.