Stuffed at Foster's Bighorn, Rio Vista

In my mind?  A bar filled with taxidermied animals should be the coolest place in California.  There should be wicker furniture everywhere, big mosquito netting, and huge exposed wooden posts holding the building up.  Or at least bikers cracking beer bottles over each other's heads, with Alabama playing on the jukebox and a bartender with the business end of a pool cue ready to pound some heads if things get out of hand.  

This is not so at Foster's Bighorn Sportsmen's Headquarters, in Rio Vista, California. Animals adorned all free wall space and much of the counter space in this bizarre international zoo.  The entire place took on a shabbiness found in most small town bars.  The chipped linoleum matched the green pleather covered chairs and the fake plants adorning the few remaining spots not housing dead animals.  The dining area was lit by florescent lighting found only in the finest Denny's Restaurants.  

I was hoping to order some exotic entrees but found myself staring at a menu pretty common for a bar/restaurant in a coastal town (well, Delta coast anyway).  My first thought was to at least order the Bison burger as there were two Bison hanging pretty close to our table, but a cooler head prevailed and I opted for the NY strip steak.  

I wonder if this is what Bill Foster envisioned as a housing for his "trophies" as he made his trips to Africa, Alaska, Greenland, India, Mexico, and Canada during the 20's, 30's and 40's.  Bill Foster settled in Rio Vista in 1931, after changing his name (from Frates to Foster) to elude assistant district attorney Earl Warren.  it seems Foster was a bootlegger in Alameda.  With those two "hobbies', big game hunting and bootlegging, it seems natural for him to create a bar featuring all of his trophies.  

Although not what I expected, Foster's Bighorn is an interesting exhibit of a by gone era.  As politically correct and evolved as I tend to believe I am, there still exists a part of me that imagines myself on a 1920's safari, enduring hardships but experiencing the excitement of the hunt...in a starched shirt and pith helmet of course.  Romanticized view of a barbaric practice, yes, I know.  But alluring none-the-less and ethically affordable as the opportunity will never present itself in this day and age.  In other words, overly romanticized fantasies are free.  

Our African adventure included Jamie, his wife Patty, and their two very sweet, well mannered boys, Marlin and Jackson.  Next time though, I'm foregoing the steak and potato dinner and making a beeline straight to the bar for an evening of serious martini drinking...it just seems right to have martinis while being stared down by the heads of exotic animals.  

Our safari Guide, Jaimie, protecting us from the wild animals...and the bizarre but friendly waitress.

Patty, enjoying thirty seconds of rest, before bolting up to rescue her two boys under the age of three. 

Big game hunter, rusty, bringing down a rack of ribs.

Another whim indulged!

 This is one of the only mounted elephant heads in existence today.  13 feet from the base to the tip of the trunk.  The tusks weigh 110 lbs. each and are mounted on the wall under the elephant.

This moose has an antler spread of 72 inches, one of the largest in the world, or so claimed Bill Foster.  I imagine a man with so many trophies might be prone to some exaggeration.  

Gentle readers, this is a stop worth making just to say you have done this!  A word of advise, for go the over priced under inspired dinner, go straight to the bar for a few martinis and enjoy a fantasy about big game hunting in the 1920's.  There are worse ways to spend an evening!

Halloween to Christmas and Everything In Between

The beauty of Oakland is not easily found, but when found it tends toward urban grandeur as is the case with these fantastic iron dinosaurs on the bay.  Gentle readers, my apologies for my blogosphere absence, but the roller coaster of life has afforded few opportunities to reach out to my fan base for regular updates.  This fall, the challenges have been more than a few, especially at work.  After my school entered program improvement a flurry of activities occurred, unfortunately many instigated by me.  Needless to say, the current state budget crisis has left schools with little resources and few options.  But the staff are troopers and have continue to amaze me by rising to every challenge set before them.

After our summer trip to Europe, stay-cations and bringing friends to us are the order of the day and our bank accounts thank us for it.  In this spirit, Lisa, my lovely former coworker, and a fantastic friend dragged her husband to visit Oakland as their daughter Alex is currently working in the Bay Area.  We spent happy hour at a new favorite, The Lake Chalet, before heading to the bay to stroll Jack London Square.

A bit of a breeze on the bay...brrrrrrr.  

The Last Stand...a bar frequented by Jack London in his day.  We enjoyed a Hangar One Cocktail at the picnic tables in front of this bar.  The floor of the bar slopes horribly and there is no inside space, but on the positive side it is over priced and the drinks are served in plastic cups...ugggg.

Unfortunately, our good friends had to leave after a very brief visit...just a tease really but lots of giggles and hugs.  

Halloween?  A beautiful day, with sunshine galore.  Our annual elementary school parade was an international theme, so of course I had to don the lederhosen.  Yes, we would all like to see a photo of me in knee length leather pants and I'm sure there are many photos circulating around our school community...no worries, one day one will surface and in the spirit of willingness to constantly humiliate myself for the amusement of my fans...I'll post it.  

On Halloween Day our Halloween Horror Flick began as most flicks of this ilk...the two hapless heroes were working on the deck on a bright sunny day...as the late afternoon haze cooled down the day, only one more task remained.  Rusty scurried up the ladder to reposition a bracket and suddenly the evil possessed ladder slipped from beneath him.  Rusty tumbled from about 10 feet off the ground and landed on the ladder.  A quick trip to Alta Bates Emergency in Berkeley...three hours later and lots of questions about whether this was domestic violence related, Rusty walked away with one broken rib.  Side note:  I waited until after the doctor said Rusty didn't damage any internal organs before saying, "I told you so" as I told him to change out the ladder.  Another side note:  The doctor reminded us if he were smoking pot not to inhale and hold it in as it may further damage his rib...I'm pretty sure none of our North Carolina doctors ever provided this type of advise.  Only in the bay area.

Feeling the joys of prescription strength medication.

Soon after I found myself at a conference in Las Vegas.  The two day conference was actually excellent.  It was nice bonding with coworkers and seeing the many sites of this desert oasis. One highlight was a dinner at Max Brennans chocolates.  I'm not a huge chocolate fan but this stuff was other worldly good, and could make me a believer!  

This autumn has been punctuated by a constant focus on getting the deck completed.  The work had to continue despite Rusty's incapacitated state.  Luckily his ribs healed fairly quickly and he was back on the job site in no time...a little wiser and a lot more cautious.  

There are a few pleasures in this world I truly love, one of them is the SF Museum of Modern Art and another is wine.  One would think combining these two things would produce an almost unbearable euphoria...oddly not the case.  The MOMA had a show with some catchy phrase, but the gist was about how wine became popularized in the US especially as of the last 30 years.  We attended with good friends on member's night.  The lines for wine tasting were so long and the tastes were so expensive, it hardly seemed worth the effort ( yeah, I know, blasphemy but luckily the regular wine bar set up for such occasions had a shorter line and served a barely passable cabernet, although no less expensive).  

Of course we are complete label shoppers and the wine bottles were arranged into different categories based on their labels.  This part of the show was mildly interesting even through the struggles of hundreds of people.  

Zeke and Dave joined us for a big night in the city.  (It's tough to get these two out of the burbs but good for them for making the trek especially on a rain soaked evening).  

Heidi attended and dragged her two sisters along.  Heidi is always my favorite artist with whom we attend these events.  Knowledgable, smart, and sexy...is this my long lost twin separated at birth?  That is, in fact, Rusty in the background donning a hat as it was a chilly night and after visiting his mom in Florida, he shaved his head in solidarity for his mom because the chemo. has finally caused his mom's hair loss.  By the way, chemo. for his mom is finished and it seems mom is in remission...Hooray.  

Warning, the following images are somewhat graphic in nature and should be viewed only by non vegetarians.  Thanksgiving; and I decided to try my hand at a Turduckhen.  This is a deboned chicken stuffed inside a deboned duck stuffed inside a deboned turkey.  Who knew deboning so many birds would require the patience a skill of a master surgeon?  Finally finished, the results speak for themselves.  

Franken-Turkey

And ready for serving.  The results were good, but certainly not great.  We dragged this crazy concoction over to Liz and Paul's house and served it up to some pretty finicky eaters.  Luckily the most finicky eater, Paul, was out of town.  I would've hated to have to beat him senseless with a drumstick if he had been there and decided not to eat any  of this bird which required monumental effort.

Liz and Emma enjoying the day.  

...and more deck building.  

December has been filled with cold, wet, rainy days.  Much needed snow pack fills the Sierras but it does push our deck schedule back somewhat.  

More urban beauty as Emeryville displays a shopping cart Christmas tree.  

Rusty dons his gay apparel from his birthday (Dec. 5th) to Christmas, insisting on singing carols and wearing one of his many Santa hats every where we go. We did host Rusty's annual chili party for his birthday with a few friends.  Some excellent company and wonderful conversation made for a great birthday.  Rusty's Birthday fairy gave him the coveted LP: Buckingham Nicks, the first album of Lindsay Buckingham and Stevie Nicks before joining Fleetwood Mac (for those of you young enough to be  unfamiliar with an LP, it is a vinyl disc played on a turntable by a "floating" needle...wikipedia ought to give a good explanation of this relic)  By the way, the chili, a "Joy of Cooking" recipe, was excellent.  

I need to apologize to everyone that ever sat on our old deck.  Upon removing the old decking boards we expected to find a little bit of dry rot and expected to do minor repairs.  Wow, thankful no one plummeted to their death as we had to replace most of the 2X6 struts, and had to replace the ledger board.  Luckily, the repairs went well and within a day we completed everything including replacing the decking boards.  This isn't how most people spend Christmas Eve, I'm sure.  

The old ledger board dry rotted...we'll need to sacrifice a virgin to the gods for keeping all of our guests safe on the old deck...we may need to drive outside of the bay area to find one of course.  

The finished work...we spent Christmas eve on the deck underneath cloudy skies having oysters and champagne. A nice evening after a long day of deck building... 

 Christmas morning...the in-laws sent a Pink Panther shirt and a Gluggle Jug (Yes, it makes a gurgling sound when pouring water).  Rusty, of course, did not stick to our keep-it-simple Christmas rule, and provided lots of nifties, including a new rain jacket...it had to happen eventually that my first "professional administrators" coat had to die.  New slippers and a cashmere sweater completed the nifty gifties...spoiled?  Most definitely.  Rusty's gift?  An adirondack deck chair...is there anything more comfortable?

Ahhh...the good life on a homemade deck with a cedar Adirondack Chair...the only thing missing of course is a Natural Light...or Nattie Light...as our favorite Virginia redneck, Jamie, is wont to say!  

Cooking Christmas dinner for a few friends...this year the goal was to finish cooking before the cocktails...let's just say, I almost made it..No worries, dinner did make it to the table in a timely manner.  

Fancy Schmancy!

Everyone enjoying our newest tradition, Christmas Crackers...Jokes, Prizes, and Hats?  That's crazy talk...

The Christmas Paella...one was Seafood only, and the other was chicken and chorizo.   When coupled with the highly potent Sangria...Delicious.  Appetizers were supplied by Monique and Lance, who were sorely missed at the festivities.  The two sent a smoked meat sampler from Neu Braunfels, Texas...as we all know nothing says Merry Christmas like smoked meat!  Well, Christmas seemed to come and go at a record pace.  The deck continues to be a major noose around our necks but we are making significant progress.  Only stairs and railings remain in this never ending building cycle (hopefully we will have a few rain free days to make a little more progress).

New Year's Eve approaches and a promise to update at least once between now and my restart to the school year.  Remember to comment if at possible...and please enjoy a Happy and Safe new Year!