Eighties, Eats, and the Dam Pictures

It's always a bit of a gamble to stay on the mainland for spring break, but I guess Las Vegas was the place to take that bet. Literally, on the day we arrived temperatures shot up and stayed at near record highs until the day we left. Just seeing green grass and flowers was a treat, but being able to sit poolside was a bonus.

Besides enjoying the sun, we took in a show, and ate...and ate, and ate. I had several Wynn croissant breakfasts, pasta at the new Sinatra restaurant in the Encore, Kobe beef burgers at Nine in the Palms, the best Mahi Mahi tacos ever, and perfectly grilled organic chicken over Mac & Cheese with trufffles at Stripsteak. Vegas has become quite the food mecca over the last few years, and we had some of the best meals we've ever had on this year's vacation. The guys weren't so lucky with their NCAA basketball picks. From the grumbling I heard from some of the other passengers on our flight home, it didn't sound like they were alone.

And for the first time ever we rented a car and drove out to Hoover Dam. We didn't technically take the dam tour, but we did endure all the dam traffic to get out there. By the time we finally arrived, we weren't in the best of moods for touring. It is an impressive sight. In fact, the new construction of the Hoover Dam Bypass is every bit as interesting as the dam itself. Bascially, we walked around a bit, took the dam pictures, and hit the road--happy to be finally going against the long line of cars.

My trip knitting was a big bust. Since I was only working on a scarf and gauge was not a big issue, I decided to try and purl the "right way" for a change. I've always purled the quick way that gets the job done. The problem with this method is that it leaves the stitch on the needle facing the wrong direction. Most of the time, it doesn't matter, but there are some patterns where I do have to turn the stitch on the needle to make the new stitches turn out correctly. I've had this pointed out to me in the past, but I never really cared until I was scolded via my new DVDs by Elizabeth Zimmermann. So, why not give it a try, I thought. And I gave it a good try. I knit about 14" on my cabled scarf. I adapted to the motion quickly enough. It was the tension that I could never adjust. No matter how hard I tried, those purl rows had stitches that were big enough to poke your finger through. In the end, I frogged the whole works and started over, reverting back to my bad habits. I'm almost back to the point where I gave up, and it's nice and smooth. Sorry EZ.