East Bay

Please Don't Eat The Birds

There's a new blog on the block dedicated to the fine town of Oakland. Despite titling the site off a tired meme, Fuck Yeah Oakland, it's currently shaping up to be one of the better Oakland blogs with food, street art, photography, and coverage of other such East Bay happenings.  Not much for cultural commentary, but hey, at least we have a solid stream of snaps reminding us not to eat the tasty, poison-filled birds that live in Lake Merritt.

[Fuck Yeah Oakland]

Forgot Noise Pop Tickets? MONSTER JAM!

If you grew up in the Bay Area in the 90s, it was nearly impossible to watch syndicated episodes of The Simpson/Full House/Sister Sister (Roger ftw!) without regularly being interrupted by a demonic voice-over warning you that Monster Jam was about to head to “OAK-LAND, SAN JOSE!” to tear shit up with over sized baby-dick compensating vehicles with names like 'Grave Digger' or 'Maximum Destruction'. As a child I always wonder who the fuck would actually spend money to go to these rallies. Now, as an adult, I ask “$15 for all-you-can-mock people watching and the chance of death and/or loss of limb? And I can get shit faced and BART directly there?? Why the fuck not?“ 

As Kevin pointed out to me, San Franciscans love nothing more than hating on automobiles, so it only makes sense we go to an event dedicated to smashing cars, right? I think there's some truth to that. Think about it: San Franciscans love getting drunk, hating automobiles, and going to Oakland so they look well rounded. So why don't they love monster jam?

Wait, don't answer that… Just tuck away your pretentious ego for a few hours and bury it in some Earthquake Hi-Gravity malt liquor and Monster energy drink, and come hang out with all your Myspace friends from Anitoch at the Oakland Coliseum this Saturday. Be sure to get the bassist from Papa Roach to autograph your program! (HINT: He's working at one of twelve concession stands on site).

Grave Digger r00lz

 

(Event details here)

Oakland's Latest Mac n' Cheese Spot Opens Today

Looks fancy.

I've been on a mac n' cheese kick lately, so it's worth noting that the City of Oakland, aka the new Mission District, is home to a new mac restaurant, Homeroom.  Plenty of solid meat and meat-free options, reasonable beer prices despite a lack of canned beer for sale (!!!), and, naturally, Vegansaurus! is all sorts of pumped for their vegan mac:

Oh hellllll yeah. Finally some vegan mac and cheese action up in this joint! I know of only two other places serving vegan mac and cheese in the entire Bay Area: Souley Vegan (some people love it, some people leave it) and Herbivore (If you held a gun to my head and forced me to eat either Herbivore mac and cheese or Hazel’s dog shit, I’d think reallllllly hard. And then I’d eat the mac and cheese but GOOD GOD, it’s the funk). If you know of others, please let a fat vegan know.  Anyway, Homeroom (adorable name) is opening on 40th street in Oakland on Tuesday, Feb. 15

Thankfully, Homeroom is a mere 6 minute walk from the MacArthur BART station, so you can stuff you face cheese and carbs and be back at the 500 Club before the horrifying reality that you left San Francisco sets in.

(link)

Long Neck 4 Life

 

This Friday, Aristocrats in San Jose will be hosting the opening reception for notorious Bay Area street artist Girafa's new exhibit Black Is The New Yellow. Make the trek to SJ for art, booze, & cool kids, as well as the release of a limited edition Aristocrats & Girafa collaboration shirt. Rumor is the man himself will also be there.

Stolen Brooks Saddles: The Latest Boom Industry?

Reader Neb hips us to this Craigslist post on the subject

I was at the Laney College flea market yesterday, and there were many, many Brooks saddles to be had, black & brown, sprung & unsprung, most in great shape, and most with the post still attached. Of course, the bikes were no longer attached, and the sellers did not appear to be avid cyclists. I asked a couple sellers and the price seems to be around $50-60.

This seems to an industry in bloom - Invest in a saddle lock, but if and when your saddle is stolen, you'll know where to find it!  

Coincidentally, my buddy Ben, he of getting-his-bike-stripped-outside-of-Doc's-Clock-then-losing-it-off-his-bike-rack fame, had two, that's right, TWO Brooks saddles stolen last month.  He built the bike up on Christmas Eve, taking all the usual precautions (chaining the saddle to the frame and wrapping the chain in a tube).  Yet, he still had his new saddle stolen 36 hours later while his bike was parked on Market outside the Westfield.  His conclusion was to buy a third, crappier saddle and take it with him every time he parked his bike.  My conclusion was that fate intended for him to be a rollerblader.

The picture above was part of the chain-breaker that the thief left at the scene of the crime, suggesting our city's crackheads have caught up to our anti-theft tricks.  I guess all that's left to do is either outfit your bike with shitty, worthless parts or, if you really want to irritate yourself, stuffing all your bolts with tinfoil and hot wax.

HOODSLAM this Saturday: "Don't bring your f'n kids!"

In a cramped Oakland warehouse, covered in graffiti from floor to ceiling, a battle is raging.  The air is thick with [medical] marijuana smoke while onlookers guzzle 40oz's in anticipation, their minds already warped from the sideshow freaks and heavy metal bands that opened the evening's festivities.  The microphone chirps as the announcers prattle off the next bout; “…Hoodslam is proud to present, Zombie Vinny Boutabi versus Gotho the Bi-Polar Clooooooown!!!”  What emerges from backstage is as absurd as it sounds and delivers the clown vs zombie gore-fest that the crowd has been waiting for. 

This is not your average small time amateur pro-wrestling circuit.  This is as Oakland as it gets.  Hoodslam is a bizarre fusion of East Bay hipster, thug culture, metal and pro-wrestling with a sprinkling of sideshow freaks.  The story lines are insane; the characters surreal.  In the world of Hoodslam, zombies, cartoons and video game characters do battle against traditional luchador and WWE style wrestlers.  At the moment, the Street Fighter/CAPCOM characters reigning over Hoodslam with an iron fist of tyranny.  We're seriously talking about Ken and Ryu in the ring; I think that even MegaMan made a cameo at some point.

The Displayed Labors sideshow entertains between fights.

THE POINT: The aptly titled 'Hoodslam 2 FOURTH STRIKE: Tournament Edition 3D' is tomorrow.  And it's free for the last time.  This last show of the season promises to be a big one.  Ryu will fight a masked Luchador.  E Honda battles a guy in a banana costume.  The 'Stoner Bros' will be pitted in a tag-team match against Carmen San Diego and Where's Waldo.  Referee Pink Panther vs. Senior Official Winnie the Pooh.  It goes on and on (Facebook event details here).

So tomorrow at 8pm, make your way to the 'Victory Warehouse' at 24th and San Pablo in Oakland, for Hoodslam: “The only 420 friendly, b.y.o.beer, music, wrestling, entertainment event of its kind”.

Oh, and if you actually want to know more about this bat-shit insane plot, there's a ridiculous five minute video below that explains the background of the 'Capcom Wars' and previews this Saturday in painful detail.

Again, cause yer dum: (Facebook event details here).

 

 

 

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