Hallow?

ER. Um. I could barley keep from laughing today when one of the plant electricians came to warn me about using the bathroom. He was trying not to be crude, but I don't know if there's any way to communicate the following warning without being crude:

The toilets flush into a pneumatic eductor which then pumps the sewage to the septic tank. Well... Sometimes the vent valve doesn't close, so the stuff will go down... and immediately come back up with... er... great force... No a pleasant experience, according to the electrician. In other words, make sure you're not on the toilet when you flush it, and if you hear any air noises, RUN. I had wondered why the bathroom was so clean.

Men, I like traveling with Ben. He actually likes to do things instead of jamming as much work into 24hrs as possible and then talking about it over dinner. (I would have said, "Man, I like...", but every once in a while, more than one person reads my blog :-)

Yesterday, we got done early, so Ben was like, "We should do something." I was like, "Sweet." He was like, "What should we do?" I was like, "Uh... Don't matter to me. We could go see a movie or something." He was like, "Awesome."

We then drove around Montrose looking for theaters with something worth seeing. I like Montrose. It contains two theaters -- total, you could go see one of six movies -- the worst being rated "PG-13." So, we went to this weird place that must have been built back when it was a real theater -- not a movie theater. It was kind of creepy, full of stained glass, old light fixtures, thick red curtains, etc.

I think that theater could hold more than the total population of Montrose, so there wasn't a run of seats. We decided to see "Star Trek" and sat and waited for it to begin. It was kinda cool -- no previews. Just ads for local businesses. I was surprised to see an ad for the tiny pizza place we ate dinner at. One really tacky ad said, "You always said you wouldn't be caught dead in that dress. Tell them before it's too late. Delta Cemetery."

When the movie was ready to begin, the operator came down to the front and welcomed us, told us to turn off our cell phones, and said, "Buckle your seat belts! It gets pretty exciting! Now, before I go up and start the movie, let me warn you that the previews have some scratches in them -- they were used. The actual movie is just fine." It's nice to be in a small town once in a while, and I really enjoyed most of it. (Typical Hollywood -- always something that keeps you from being able to recommend it to friends.)

I actually really like Montrose. Such a nice break from Las Vegas. It's big enough that it has a Home Depot, etc. but small enough that everyone knows each other. Seems like such an innocent town. I wouldn't mind living there, but I don't want to be a plant engineer, so I guess I need to change careers. :-)

LOL! The first night we got there, we ate at Applebees. As we were escorted to our table, we passed two youngins who were obviously on a date. (Us oldfolkys can tell.) I didn't think a thing about it until them youngins came and talked to their parents who were sitting right next to us. Funny! Youngins dating one one side of the restaurant, parents chatting on the other. I thought to myself, "Now that's the way to do it!" It was kinda cool to see mature kids. Nice break from Elitches! :-)

Anyway, I'm in Grand Junction now. Ben and I walked around town looking for a place to eat. After finding that the map of downtown assumes you know which names mean "food" and which mean "shopping," we eventually went to check out an Italian place. True, we didn't spend anything close to per-Diem today, but our FR clothing didn't quite match the formal wear of the clients. So, we ended up at some restaurant/brewery and I had a good pile of Chicken Fried Snake. Quite good. About $20/plate. Ben paid about $24 because he had to try one of the house brews. Yadda, yadda, yadda. I'm SO sick of beer. Beer, beer, beer -- seems to be one of the only words in the English language.

We worked at Crystal dam today -- just upstream of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. It's a cool canyon, so visit it if you're ever in the area. The access road for Crystal Dam was not unlike other access roads in that it was steap and windy, but this was far more extreme than anything I've ever seen before. The road started at the canyon rim and ended at the bottom -- a drop of about 2,000ft. Some of the hairpin curves were so steep and narrow that they've installed mirrors so you can see if anyone is coming. I'm glad I wasn't there to back the trucks down when they built the dam -- at least, I assume that's what they used.

We finished early, so Ben and I walked around Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. Since the road to Crystal starts in the park, we got in for free :-) It was quite fun.