Well, I was over at a friends eating BBQ Sunday night when we hear tires squealing and then metal on metal(not like a car crash crunch sound),more tires squeal and then a BIG crash, then more tires squealing and another crash. We run around the corner and a car is sitting in the middle of the street leaking radiator fluid and it's nose to nose with a big white SUV. There is a guy sitting on the ground fumbling with some envelopes and a whole lot of people standing around. It seems that he sideswiped a truck parked on the street and then veered into a house smashing a large hole into the front of the house, breaking the windows and the front door. A small child who lives there was standing in the doorway a minute before the car hit. He's OK. The guy then backed out and drove down the lawn barely missing the fire hydrant and a light pole before he crashed into an SUV and couldn't get the car started again.

After he sorted out his envelopes??? he started walking down the street and the neighbor followed him with his cell phone and led the cops right to him. He was so drunk he didn't know anything had happened. CRAZY!!

So today I went to the annual Gold Rush Days in Old Sacramento. They tried to recreate life from 1850-1880. They had three different areas, one for civil war era re creationists, one for wild west shootouts(not really part of Sac. history, but fun) and an area with games and plays from that period. They also had carriage rides, stagecoach rides, and steam engine train rides. All in all pretty fun. Oh yeah, they brought in 200 tons of dirt to cover the roads and only left the cobblestones uncovered.

If you have a lot of time, here is around 400 photos from the event. Enjoy!
http://gallery.mac.com/tedwca#100014&view=mosaic&sel=0

Great pix Ted! The shootouts looked pretty authentic, and so did the prostitute.

Glad that kid didn't get run over - I was hoping that the cops ended up having to shoot the guy as I was reading the story. I'm glad he got his papers organized <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

I thought you'd like her. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

If you look closely there are some pics of a forge. They had a cool blacksmith shop set up, but it was really hard to get any good photos. You can see the kid pumping the bellows to heat up an iron bar.

Cool - I'll take another peek!

Here's one

They were giving free samples of this stuff. I had to pass. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

How could you pass on Beaver Dicks? They sound GREAT!!

To each their own I guess.

BTW, your limon helmet is getting a little ripe isn't it?

My sister lives in Calgary and they have a HUGE wild west themed event called the Calgary Stampede which goes back to when all the cattlemen brought there cows into town at the end of the season. Apparently the prostitutes they get there now are a LITTLE to authentic. For a while in Canada girls from overseas could get visas to work as strippers which was just legalized slavery. I can only imagine the payoff it took to get that one through parliament. It was the human rights crusaders who managed to get it shut down after some of the local girls ratted out. They didn't like the idea of outsourcing any more than anyone else. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Nice pictures. Old fashion days are alway a blast. One year they had a quick draw competiion at ours. Made we want to invest in some leather and an old colt.

Sounds like you had a very interesting holiday weekend... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/ooo.gif" alt="" />

I worked all weekend... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" /> Oh well better busy, than bored and broke... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

Looks like a good time. Cool pics.