The Fairest of them All

Growing up, I was never much of a fan of the fair. Why? Possibly because I lived in two of the most podunkville counties known to man--places where the main event was determining which 4-H-er grew the biggest steer that year.

Fast forward 10 years, and I'm still not a huge fan. Our little neighborhood is just too close to the fairgrounds for comfort during those two weeks when the state fair rolls around. We have to deal with crazy traffic, cars blocking our driveway, litter in our yard.

On the plus side, we do get a front row seat to our own little parade of fairgoers....I promise, you've never seen so many mullets and gigantic belt buckles in your life. It's also exciting to watch the fights that inevitably break out between the fair drunkards in the parking lot of the Wal-Mart.

Anyway, given my long history of fair animosity, I had about decided that the McMurry family would not be attending this year. But then Riley found out the fair was in town, and made this face:

And who am I to say no to a face like this? (correction---faces like these. Sam was pretty excited too.)

So, we went to the fair and ended up having a pretty smashing time.

Riley almost passed out from the thrill of having so many fun toys to ride on.




Then, we went to the petting zoo and paid an arm and a leg for a miniature-sized cup of grain. All the animals looked like they were about to pop from being feed non-stop for two weeks, and none of them wanted anything to do with us. That is, until one goat wandered over, stuck his head through the fence, and yanked the grain right out of Riley's hands and ate every last bite. And then he ate the cup.

And Riley, of course, started wailing. At the top of his lungs. I think that's the loudest I have ever heard this kid yell, and that's saying a lot. And all of a sudden, in a noisy petting zoo filled with 200 people and lots of stinky animals, everything went absolutely silent. And then everyone turned and stared at us. At least, that's how it seemed to me.

After our somewhat hasty exit from the petting zoo, I was introduced to the culinary love of my life:


State fair corn dogs. Uummmmmm.... I always thought the culinary love of my food life would be creme brule or some other sophisticated food with a fancy french name that I never know exactly how to pronounce. But, nope, turns out it's a corn dog. I'm not exactly sure what this says about me.

Want to know my favorite part of the fair? The time when Sam actually plunked down money (granted, it was only 50 cents) to take a peek at one of the freak booths. We stood by this booth for approximately 3 hours waiting in line for the rides with Riley, so I have the schpill memorized. "Come see the girl with the face of an angel and the body of a disgusting, 200 pound snake. She has traveled all around the world telling her fascinating story to thousands of people and will gladly answer all of your questions."

So Sam entered the booth only to find out that....well...I don't want to completely ruin the snake girl's chance to make a living for herself, seeing as how she probably has to buy rats for all of her snake babies to eat. But lets just say that her secret involves a table with a hole cut in it and a snake girl who inexplicably doesn't have the ability to move her own snake body.