A Small Investment in Our Marriage

I go out of town for twenty-seven hours, and you all posted at once!!!  I think my friends' latest posts were five pages long!  So there is no way I am going to catch up here -- I am already behind in the house work and everything else.  Including my exercise program, Carrie.

My dear husband and I went out of town this week for our twentieth wedding anniversary, to a little historic town, Boulder City, NV.  This is close to where we live, but not too close.  Boulder City is where the people stayed who built the Hoover Dam (also called Boulder Dam, if you have been confused).  The building of the Hoover Dam provided jobs for 5000 men during the Great Depression.  The history of the area is very interesting, and the world looks upon the dam as an engineering wonder, which surely it is.  But the men withstood the blowing sand, 140 degree temps, and the dangers of the construction to keep from losing their jobs... there must have been a lot of hardship.  In fact, it really looks like it was slavery.  Men will do what they have to when they are desperate, huh? It truly is a feat.  I don't think there are many people today who would go through that. That was a different kind of character than most of what we see in people today. 

We stayed at the oldest hotel in the little town, where the managers and bureaucrats and diplomats and movie stars stayed when they came to see the great dam back in the 1930's.  It is done up very nicely and has been modernized so that there is a computer for the clients' use (very important for those of us who would keep up with our blogging while away from home!)

We had a very, very nice time together... I do love my children so much, but being alone with my husband for 24+ hours was very good for the marital relationship. We made a stop at my DH's favorite cycling store, where I very patiently waited for him to quit talking shop with the store owner, when he was supposed to be totally focused on ME. (Get a load of this -- the store owner THANKED ME for "letting" my husband ride his bike.  Please. My DH does not need my permission to do anything.)  The next morning we walked through the old section of town and stopped in a couple of crafty/thrifty stores so I could get even with him, lol.  NO, not really. But he does hate that kind of shopping!

We tried to take a picture of ourselves together on this special day.  What a couple of goofs!
"HA HA! That's terrible! You try. The button's on the wrong side of the camera for me to do it."

"Oh no, I have my eyes shut.  Try again."

"That's better... We'll touch it up with Photoshop."

On our way home we drove over the dam, parked, and walked halfway back to take some pictures.  We have seen the dam before, but it is worth seeing more than once.  For one thing, the landscape is beautiful. And unless you have been there, you just can not imagine the size of that thing and the engineering that is being put to work there. Ever since 9-11 security is really tight, prices are sky high and there are signs everywhere telling you all the things you aren't allowed to do.  But it's still a good place to see. I enjoyed listening to all the foreign languages being spoken!  So here are a few pics, which do not do the place one bit of justice:

This is up-river from the dam.  The colors in the rocks are so beautiful, but you can't see them here.  The water level is really down right now.

These intake towers, which are some 400 ft tall, are where the water goes into the dam, and then down and through the turbines that generate electricity for parts of Nevada, Arizona, and all of Southern California... maybe some other places, too.

This is a view of the other side of the dam. See the microscopic cars down there on the road?

When they are letting water over the dam, it comes out these round holes here on the other side. (There are two of these buildings -- one on each side of the river.) The openings don't look very big, but the water that shoots out of ONE of these would fill an Olympic sized swimming pool in three seconds. 

A couple of years ago a big crane broke and fell on the highway or something, and for a while all the traffic was detoured for a long way.  Traffic can go over the dam now, but there is a huge project going on to build a bridge over the gorge.  When that is done, traffic will no longer be allowed over the dam. If you like to do research, find out how they are going to make this bridge. Will it partly be a suspension bridge? There is no way they can put any more of these big pylons down the face of the cliffs. Wish I had gotten the water in this shot so you could see how steep the gorge is. See the street lights along the wall?  This bridge is SO HIGH!!!  UPDATE:  I found a "photo" of the new overpass here, and it is not going to be a suspension bridge, after all.

This is a view of the front of the dam.  It is one of the highest dams in the world, and not a place to look over the edge if you are afraid of heights! To help you see how huge this is, if you look very closely you can see teeny weeny people along the rim, and a motor home on the far side. I'm thinking these horizontal lines in the face of the dam are five feet apart. ??

Well, there you go. That is the extent of my filming abilities.  Not very good -- I wish I had a really good perspective shot.  So.  We had a wonderful time.  And so did my girls!  They were very unhappy to see us show up to get them. Well, we'll just have to do it again!

Oh, and for the curious, what did I get my dear husband as an anniversary gift?  Well, we aren't big on gifts for each other, but thanks to a tip from bubbebobbie, I got him a bag of something he loves, but does not need -- green M&M's. No, he's not overweight.  What I meant was, he has me!!