Foul Bingo

You've heard of Bingo, but have you heard of Chicken SH** Bingo? Allow me to enlighten you to one of the more redneck activities Austinites enjoy on any given Sunday. This past Sunday I introduced, my friends Jessica and Eric and my out-of-town guest Steve, to the wonders of Chicken Sh** Bingo.

The setting for Chicken Sh** bingo takes place inside a true dive bar on the North side of town called Ginny's Little Longhorn Saloon. Ginny's Little Longhorn Saloon is a tiny white and Texas orange building with a steeple flanked by a futon store and car inspection site amidst a series of strip malls. The one room setting is just large enough to contain a bar, a band, a few tightly packed tables, and a pool table. Decorations include a Nascar billiard light, beer signs, Kodaks of customers from what appear to be the 80's, a sign that reads general dentistry, two tiny TVs, and of course, a set of longhorns. It is unclear how long this place has been around as there is no working website for the bar. Furthermore, collaborating historical information on dive bars in the Austin area is sparse. Google Fail. Using context clues I will presume that Ginny's has been around for at least 20-30 years, if not longer.

Ginny!

The bar's namesake, Ginny, is an actual person. She appears to be in her 70-80s with a a grown daughter and granddaughter reportedly also named Ginny*. Ginny still serves up beers and regulates the proceedings of Chicken Sh** Bingo weekly.

On Sunday's the pool table is covered with plywood board with a chicken wire cage placed atop numbers 1-50. The bar begins to fill up around 3pm and overflows into a tailgate in the parking lot until the proceedings begin around 5pm. Tickets are sold to the quickest customers to queue around the table for $2 a pop. Ginny then fills the cage with feed and places her chicken in there for the masses to await her excrement to fall on their chosen number. When it falls the pot of around $100 in "donations" is awarded to the lucky ticket holder.

Possibly winning tickets

While you await the chicken to sh**, Ginny provides the humans with $2 Lonestar Bottles and free chili dogs served out of Ginny's crock pot. The famous Dale Watson Band performs and a few customers attempt to two step in the tiny space provided. The staff are wonderful, they treat you like you are a guest in their own home trying to make you feel as welcome as possible.

Chicken not Sh**ing

I have attended Chicken Sh** Bingo on various occasions, but have never won. They generally run 3 rounds, however, on this most recent visit, the first round took over an hour and a half for the chicken to do her business and we had to leave before we could win. I suppose there is no way to regulate the speed of digestion, but it would have been nice to see the Sh** we came for.

Be forewarned this event isn't for everyone and they only take cash.Nonetheless, I will continue to attend and one day I will go and the Chicken will Sh** on my number. I just know it.


http://www.yelp.com/biz/ginnys-little-longhorn-saloon-austin

*not verified, just found in my nearly fruitless google search.

Rough and Tumble

This past weekend guests were in town and not wanting to dissapoint expectations of "Keeping Austin Weird" it was necessary to find something beyond bars to entertain us on a Saturday evening.  It was decided we would check out the TX Lonestar Rollergirls for the championship game between the Hellcats and the Cherry Bombs at the Austin Convention Center. If you have never seen a roller derby or the Drew Barrymore movie, Whip It (inspired by the TX Lonestar Rollergirls), then you probably have no idea what to expect from such an event. The TX Lonestar Rollergirls are a unique breed of sexy, self assured, athletic, and fierce women that take their job as part entertainer part athlete seriously. I say part entertainer because there is more than just speed and toughness on skates that these women require to make the TX roller derby a truly one-of-a-kind experience.

Hellcats

In simple terms the roller derby is played on a banked track with five members of  two teams attempting to have one skater (aka the "jammer") from each team pass members of the other team as many times as they can until the lead jammer calls it off. With eight minute quarters one would expect the game to go quickly, however this is where the entertainment portion of the evening comes to play. To begin with, the women are scantily clad in "uniforms" that display the uniqueness of their personality and plenty of their skin. I can only assume it is required of all roller girls to wear some form of ripped fishnets, short skirts (or apparently just underwear is suitable), and decorative items to accentuate their distinctive names. Of the names my favorites include: Honey Homicide, Miso Vicious, Pain N. Simple, and Kat Von Speed. I am not exactly sure but I think it might be like stripper names, but for the roller derby. 

Cherry Bombs

Competitive instincts and and assertive personalties result in hard earned penalties. Although all the teams practice together and they are all presumably friends off the rink, on the rink the 'bows are thrown and attitudes raised. Minor penalties such as trips are retributed by the spin of a wheel that delegates creative challenges like pillow fights, tug-of-war, and my personal favorite... the dance-off. Major penalties include unsportsladylike conduct or unnecessary roughness which send the offender to the penalty box (after the fight runs its course). We literally saw one woman stand behind another woman and smack her to the floor in one fell swoop. This gave new meaning to the term "bitch slap". I imagine these women watching WWE while they get their tattoos touched up. To help guide spectators, the entire event is emceed with hilarious commentary by several individuals who must have just missed the tryouts for last comic standing. Finally, placing the Austin stamp of approval on this event live music and alcohol are inevitably present. 

It is apparent that everyone involved is incredibly passionate about the sport and the entire roller derby community. The league is skater owned and operated and has been attributed to the resurgence of roller derby around the country. I wouldn't hold your breath for me to be cutting up my fishnets and pulling out my underwear to get beat up by a bunch of women on a roller rink anytime soon. Let's be honest, I can't even roller skate! I'll leave the tearing up of the rink and clothes to the professionals and take you out with me to watch next season.  

Saturday Evenings January-August - various locations - Tickets $10-$15. 

http://www.bggw.com/about.php

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TXRD_Lonestar_Rollergirls

Setting the Pace on the Lake

I have recently taken the liberty of excusing myself from blogging due to my busy travel and social life that took over the month of August. On a whim, my friend Jessica and I took a two week trip to Australia.  Australia lived up to our expectations and we succeeded in saturating every moment with kangaroos, koalas and of course adventure that could fill up a blog all of its own. However, I digress, as I am here to blog about Austin; and Austin, I am back and I still love you dearly. :-)

After acclimating myself back to routine I was more than thankful to have a three day weekend to soak up all that I love about Austin. Going out with friends, dinner at a new restaurant, swimming at Barton Springs, brunch, watching a friend play tennis, swimming at the pool, parties in the neighborhood, and of course a new adventure! 

As September hit Austin the 100+ degree weather finally dropped back down to somewhere in the 80's range and completely bearable and perfect for a day at the lake. Today my friend Emily agreed to take me up on checking out Pace Bend Park on Lake Travis, with Lucy, a picnic, and a few beers in tow. Just about 30 minutes West of Austin off HW-71, Pace Bend offers hiking, biking, camping, horseback riding, cliff jumping, swimming, and access points for boats and jet skis. With nine miles of shoreline there was no shortage of peaceful quite areas to park our car and have a relaxing day on the beach, even on Labor day. 

Having heard Pace Bend was a leash free area I knew Lucy would be in heaven when I opened the car door leading her to her freedom. Just out of the car and slathering on sunscreen we were abruptly informed by the unpleasant park ranger that Lucy was only allowed off leash in the water and what we thought was a fact was only a false rumor. I fully blame that man for the splotchy burn and the subsequent stubbed toe and cut finger that I suffered chasing Lucy when she spotted a vulture... 

Shortly after the setback of the rule enforcement a man in a truck with two jet skis parked himself right next to our picnic. Yes, I am completely aware of how assuming it is for a man with no other friends present to park his two jet skis next to two women on the beach. However, it is not surprising that we obliged his offer to ride his said jet skis that afternoon. Ranger Rain on Our Parade also informed us we were in the wrong area for jet skiing. We quickly moved out of his jurisdiction and had a pleasant afternoon with no further interruptions. At this point we canceled any plans to take a hike and spent the afternoon jet skiing and playing fetch with Lucy, in the water, of course. 

We departed our jet ski friend and journeyed further along the shoreline to watch brave souls jump the limestone cliffs several stories high into the water. As much fun as jumping off cliffs sounds, I plan on saving that challenge for the next excursion to Pace Bend. I also plan on making the trip back to Pace Bend quicker than I got out there in the first place. I am shocked it took me so long to venture out to this park because we absolutely loved it! 

http://www.co.travis.tx.us/tnr/parks/pace_bend.asp