30.06.12 - Dabbling in Hicksville

I’ve just realised that I missed out a whole day, which was last Sunday and was Gay Pride in SF. It has now been added in the correct order; it includes a picture of a naked man’s bum and it explains how I met Bradley who is a friend of a friend. Anyway, today we went to the Alameda County Fair which is celebrating its 100th anniversary. We drove over the Bay Bridge; out going cars drive underneath and incoming on top. When the earthquake struck it was ripped in two and people driving across it at the time plunged into the water. As soon as we crossed over the water the temperature rose incredibly quickly. SF has its own very specific micro climate, on the way back after a sweltering day we could see the clouds hanging over the city hailing our return to a very cool evening. Last night I had been asked directions by someone, when I told them that I was from London he said, ‘Oh, London, France’. I corrected him and he blamed it on being drunk. When I told Bradley the story he told me about a guy he works with who sells their product to people all over the world who thought that France still had the Franc. When Bradley told him that actually Europe now had the Euro, this guy told him that he should check his facts and he was reading all about the Franc on Wikipedia. Then the next day a friend of Bradley’s who is trying to get investment from silicon valley companies for a business school in Ghana told us that one CEO of a massive tech company had said ‘Africa, that’s in Europe right?’. You’ve got to love these people.

The Alameda County Fair was amazing; there were tacky things to buy, rip off carnival games, horse racing, lots of BBQ, live animals, live music, clowns, a Republican Party stand with the banner “Vote for Freedom, Vote Republican” and best of all people were really excited that I was English. When I showed my ID the woman behind the bar was so excited that she showed it to her colleague in

amazement. Everyone in SF is so blase about my accent, very disappointing. I obviously need to head out into hicksville. I won/was somehow muddled into buying a lurid yellow and orange toy monkey and Bradley won 3 goldfish which we took back in a plastic bag in the oven hot car. Amazingly they survived. One of the trade stands was selling wooden photo frames with names carved into them. We found 10 spellings of Hayley, or should that be Haleigh, or Haylee, or Hailee, or....The selection of names was incredible, imagine spelling every normal name with at least one ‘i’ and probably a few ‘y’s as well. But above all of this, the top things were Alaskan pig racing and Wool Riders. The little pigs were so cute, they had to jump hurdles and then they raced the little baby pigs. I thought this was the best thing I’d ever seen but the children on sheep was even better. Kids from the crowd had volunteered to compete, they were given body armour and a helmet to wear and then wrapped round a sheep that raced out of a gate down a sandy enclosure. Most of the kids

fell off within a few seconds, hopefully avoiding the hooves. If they made it to the end of the pen the sheep flung them off into a flock of raced sheep or else into the fence. How this is allowed I don’t know but I’m really glad it is; it probably made my week. I hope the photos somewhat capture the absurdity of it.

We drove bak into the foggy city and went to a bar where one of Bradley’s ex colleagues, Tommy, works a Saturday shift. Tommy still has a well paid job but just likes to work one shift a week at this total dive bar called Thieves Tavern for fun. It also means that all of his friends almost drink there for free. It was really dark with a couple of pool tables and bottles and bottles of whiskey. We actually drank beer and whiskey shots which I thought only happened in the movies. You can imagined what followed, more beer and whiskey shots, until we went to get a late night burrito - instead of rice it had chips in it, which sounds wrong but was so right.

Below are corn dogs, the most revolting looking food ever, and a solid block of curly fries.