On your marks, get set, FAIR!!!!

Oh my gosh, by this time day after tomorrow, I will be in Full Fair Mode!!! I will have eaten something really bad for me, bumped into and commiserated with other Fair Fan friends, perused the menu at the Deep Fried Heaven Truck, and generally taken in my first deep breath of My Life for the next 10 days. I can’t wait!!!!

Friends and family have come to understand that my world stops during my beloved county fair. If it doesn’t happen at the Fair, I don’t know about it. And honestly, I don’t care to know. Sort of like Disneyland or Vegas, the Fair is its own universe in a deep fried bubble. It has its own culture, its own energy, its own celebrities, its own traditions and must-sees. And I delight in becoming totally immersed in it and everything it has to offer all my senses.

It’s a wonderful, much-anticipated escape from reality for 10 blissful days.

I have been in prep-mode for a few days now. Fair Prep is a lot like Vacation Prep. Meaning I am paying all the bills that are due in the next 2 weeks, doing laundry, cleaning the house, planning my outfits, setting aside critical items I don’t want to leave home without (computer, sunscreen, Hawaiian Shaved Ice flavor list), and eating my way through the left-overs in the fridge.

Yes, that’s right, left-overs. In my normal life, I often can’t finish an entire serving of a meal. I get…are you ready?...full. Earlier this week it took me two nights to finish off a standard sized piece of cake. And the second night had a Tums chaser. But I know and trust that somehow, by the miracle and magic of The Fair, my stomach and appetite will soon take on freakish proportions and I will giddily binge my way into a Deep Fried coma. WHOO HOO!

I will be blogging again this year for the local newspaper. Yay! You can check it out here. You'll see I already got the party started about a week ago.

I'm credentialed!!!!!

The paper and I agreed that last year was a better experience for both of us, with me posting several short entries each day from the Fair itself. I then capped each day with a Photo Parade of all the food I gleefully shoved in my mouth. So that’s the plan again this year.

I will continue to blog in greater detail here at Woodhaven Ramblings. Although the newspaper has not put any limits on me, I feel a responsibility to be a little kinder and gentler with their name on the banner. I will still be honest, of course, but the perhaps more candid and outspoken observations will continue to be reserved for this space. So short and on-the-scene, and long and pointed. Rest assured I will be writing my greasy little fingers off about All Things Fair!

The only change I plan to make is the timing of my posts. In past years I have come home at about 11pm, showered, and started writing, often not crawling into bed until 2am or 3am. Finally showing the wisdom of my almost 50 years, I have realized this is not sustainable.

So this year I shall be coming home, showering, and crawling into bed all on the same day. How novel!! I will then write and post my personal blog the next morning before heading to the Fairgrounds for lunch. So expect to see posts appear here in the late morning hours instead of the crazy wee ones of the night.

Another slight difference this year is that I am more eager than ever to be away from home for the majority of the next week and a half.

Remember that water-leak-mold-lets-tear-your-house-apart project we embarked on in May (see May 16 post)? Yeah, it’s still going on. As I type, there is a very meticulous tiler named Alex cutting and setting ceramic pieces in our shower. In our game room, cabinets are being puzzled back into place now that the mushy moldy sections have been repaired. Naturally, there are issues. Amazing the impact of ¼” when you are talking crown molding. Oh my head.

Supposedly tomorrow we get new carpet. Lots of it. Taking advantage of a willing friend from out-of-town who helped move furniture around, we have been living like this since Saturday.

So it’s been noisy and disruptive and wearisome. The whole project should be finished sometime during the next week or so. But honestly, once the Fair starts on Friday, I don’t care. FAIR FAIR FAIR!!!!!