This really doesn’t pertain to the Chico Christmas card theme, but I had one last idea for a Christmas card. I wanted a simple photo of a Christmas tree with a twist — it would be presented in the same graphical style as the Obama HOPE poster. Here’s a refresher if you need it.
I was wondering how to recreate the effect. Thanks to the internets, I quickly found a tutorial. This step-by-step guide by Zach Wentz on Vectortuts makes it look relatively straightforward if you have the right software (namely Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator).
Instead of red and blue hues, my card would have green and red tones. The caption could say “TREE,” but it seems kinda lame. (Did the original poster say “OBAMA”? I think not.) I guess “HOPE” applies to Christmas too.
I guess I could do it next year, but it might be a little passe at that point. Perhaps I can produce it in a couple of year when it will seem retro, like old “Nixon for President” T-shirts.

Walking past the slightly inaccurately named Normal Street Bar on Monday yielded an interesting surprise — the longtime watering hole on Normal Avenue has closed its doors.
Blank spots marked where the bar’s signage was taken down including the iconic lamppost logo. The interior appeared to be in slight disarray. On the windows were a handful of signs saying something like, “Re-opening soon — a cleaner establishment.”
I had only been in Normal Street a handful of times, but it didn’t seem that awful to me and certainly not “unclean.” I know the carpet had a bad rap until they got rid of it.
I heard some chatter over the weekend that the Normal Street Bar was closing — primarily from a doorman at another bar who was loudly talking about it over his phone Saturday night. I walked over there to see if it was true. The Normal Street doorman couldn’t confirm anything at the time, but firsthand observation on Monday provided confirmation.
Do you have any favorite memories of Normal Street? Feel free to leave your comments here.

Some of my friends have been scratching their heads because I’ve been mentioning something called “hobo stew.” I mentioned it on my Facebook account, but I started the references in an e-mail to colleagues for a luncheon.
Here’s the relevant text:

Please respond if you have an idea on where to eat downtown. Otherwise, I’ll probably pick a shoddy place, like that guy selling hobo stew on the corner of West Ninth and Main streets (Mmmmmm, hobo stew).

To be honest, I’m sorta scratching my head about the origin of hobo stew. In my personal experience, it’s a distant memory from when I first started camping with the Boy Scouts.
IIRC, hobo stew is a simple stew that is assembled in a can of baked beans. I think it’s baked beans, a little ground beef, some veggies and some salt and pepper. What made it “hobo” was the fact that it was heated over a stove or fire in the bean can. It was then eaten directly from the can much like the stereotypical hobo would.
I might be off on the directions — it was nearly 20 years ago (eek). Maybe it was cooked in a pot and then served in the cans (apparently modern-day cans have a plastic lining to prevent contact with the food).
And, now, for the education segment on Buzz Blog, a search for “hobo stew” turned up 20,800 results. A post on Sonomapicnic.com has an interesting personal history with hobo stew and includes a recipe. Finally, Wikipedia tries to equate hobo stew with Mulligan stew.

This weekend will likely be a glorious celebration of the end of summer. I hope you have time to attend a cool musical event that will help the victims of this year’s wildfires.
At 9 p.m. Saturday, Nick’s Night Club is hosting “The Ultimate Firefight! Beatles vs. Rolling Stones.” The event features a large number of Chico and regional acts playing covers of songs from the two iconic musical groups.
If it’s anything like last year’s Elvis vs. Elvis (Presley vs. Costello), the event will be a total blast although I demand a recount of Costello’s “victory”. It’s a great way to spend an evening for five bucks and the fact that all proceeds go to the North Valley Community Fire Victims Fund makes it all the sweeter.

Heading home from work tonight showed that the four-day Labor Day weekend has begun.
It’s a three-day weekend for us working stiffs, but it appears that most Chico State students have Friday off so they’ve stretched the festivities into another day. More power to them.
It’s definitely interesting seeing how activity downtown shoots up when school starts. It almost seems to reach a fevered pitch during holiday weekends such as this. There was a definite uptick in people heading to and fro tonight.
I hope many people lay low until Sunday. That’s when the weather is supposed to turn positively pleasant as temperatures are expected to plunge by nearly 20 degrees from the 100s to the high 80s.
When it’s all said and done, I hope people have a safe and fun weekend.