biking update

This year has been a fun one for biking especially for me since I got a new rig. I’ve had a few really good rides with different buddies this year (Paul, Sheldon, Jared, etc.), ripping down trails like The Flume, Whiskey, Crown Point, Cherry Poppins, Whoopity Do, and Spring Cleaning here in Rossland and Bedframe, Placenta Descenta, and Pulmonary in Nelson, with a few more good rides coming. The boys, Aden and Cadel, and I have had the opportunity to hit the bike park and to ride a trail from Rossland down to Warfield, the Railgrade, and we have plans to hit at least one more trail (The Wagon Road) this fall. I had an opportunity to take Derek out on a quick rip while they visited in early July, and even Aisha has been able to get in on the action…good times…

Happy Birthday Aisha

Today is a special day for us… three years ago today we were joined by a precious addition to our family. She is a vibrant, energetic little girl and she is a wonderful, key part of our family.

turtle soup

So, just before we moved out here, on one of the trips I made out to look at housing, I saw what I thought were turtles sitting on a log warming themselves in the sun. Since then, every time I went past the pond where I thought I saw the turtles I have looked at the log hoping to see them again just to confirm that I really did see turtles and wasn’t just imagining things.

This past June I was cruising past the pond and I did my usual search to see if I could spot any turtles, low and behold I saw some! I could hardly believe it so I had to stop and take a good look, sure enough it was true. A few days later the kids and I returned so I could show them the turtles and take a few photos…. it was pretty cool.

what goes up must come down

Since I work in a lead refinery it’s to be expected that I would be exposed to lead in a lot of forms… solid, liquid, gas (fumes), dust. And since lead isn’t good for your body, we take a bunch of precautions to minimize our physical exposure to it. We wear coveralls, boots, a hardhat, gloves, safety glasses, and a respirator. But inevitably lead gets into your system. So, we have a medical team that monitors the blood lead levels in all Teck Cominco employees.
When I started at Teck in March my blood lead level was very low, basically nothing, but since starting work my lead level has risen, after a month (I got tested mid-April) it went up to 9 (parts per million) and then by the end of June it jumped up 12 points to 21. Yikes! So I was a wee bit concerned. So I tried some health store remedies (pills for heavy metal detox – probably good and footpads – probably a scam), took extra care to eat before work (eating helps block the absorbtion of lead into the bloodstream), was even more vigilant to clean up (hand washing, etc.) and reassessed my use of safety gear (mainly just making sure I was wearing my respirator at all times). And yahoo! It’s working! After a month my lead level has dropped 4 points to 17ppm. So, I’m going to keep at it and see how low I can get it.

Just to keep things in perspective, the average blood lead level for my shift is around 24, the allowable safe level is 30, and it becomes a concern to long term health around 60 over a long time.