THE FAIR 2015 ~ Day 10

Well, it’s over. Ten days of fun, food, stomach aches, sunscreen, llamas, Magic Brooms, concerts, motor sports, and deep fried hangovers have come to an end.

Pretty much like every year, I started to get emotional as the sun set and the wind picked up. We stayed until the Fair closed at 10pm so I could pick up my photos and canned goods. By the time we were leaving the Fair, it was already being dismantled.

I held it together until we got in the car. And then, for the first time ever, the tears actually materialized. By the time we got home, I had gone through several napkins left over from the Ceremonial Elephant Ear (see Parade below). Such a mix of emotions. Sadness, relief, wistfulness, mourning, gratitude. I’ll likely write more about that in the next couple of days.

In the meantime, here is a hodgepodge of moments that comprised The Last Day of the Fair 2015. Sigh.


I guess word finally got out about The Best Fair EVER! ‘Bout time…
Due to some churchy obligations, we didn’t arrive at the Fairgrounds until just before 2:00pm. I expected we would just saunter in and have enough time to grab lunch before settling in to hear the Fair Court Tryouts speeches. Instead, we had this:

I should have used my panorama setting to get the other
2/3s of the line.  Drat!!!

I have never seen the Fair so crowded. We parked in a section of grass I didn’t even know existed. When we approached the gates, there were lines everywhere. Luckily our passes got us in pretty quickly but that only dumped us into the masses that much faster.

Truly, I have never seen so many people at the Fair as today. And they stayed until late, too. With 30 minutes until closing, the line for the milkshakes was as long as it would be at 3:00pm. And we had to wait 15 minutes…at 9:30pm…after we ordered…for our elephant ear. Trust me, people, this is unchartered territory for our little Fair. Great for the vendors, but honestly, just way too many people for my liking.  I prefer not to cry with so many people watching.


I wonder what you have to do to get a free snow cone around here?
There are two Hawaiian Shave Ice stands on the Fairgrounds. Last year I determined that a pair of sisters made the best ices (they were generous with the syrup). So I would visit which ever snow cone hut they were working in.

I was excited to see Emily and Hannah working again this year. Hannah works the shavy machine, Emily works the register and pours the syrup. Always friendly, always efficient, always generous with their pours (they might consider bar tending when they are legal; they’d rock the tips).

Best Ice Jockeys at the Fair!
Thanks for all the syrup, Emily and Hannah!

Another notable quality about the girls is they are totally undaunted by the bees that swarm their snow cone hut. Despite traps dangling around the counter, the bees just can’t help themselves. The sickly sweet syrups are so intoxicating. (I get it, bees, truly I do.)

Just as I was finally at the front of the line, It Happened. Emily got stung. For the first time this year. And only the second time ever.

Emily remained very composed despite the stinger visibly hanging out near her armpit. She was in pain and tried to work her cell phone to get coverage so she could go to First Aid to get the pokey thing removed. But, well, the other snow cone was busy, too, and there was no coverage to be had.

So Emily tried to work the register and pour the syrups with one arm raised high. It sort of worked but not really. Meanwhile, Hannah kept working the shavy machine while nervously eyeing the line that kept getting bigger. Then Rob, sizing up the situation and being the man of action that he is, told Emily to meet him around the back and he would see if he could get the stinger out.

Now mind you, we don’t officially know Emily and Hannah. Or, well, they don’t know us. They might recognize me since I was a frequent (daily) customer for two years, but they certainly don’t know my name. And they would understandably be really freaked out to know that I know their names.

My secret? We know their cousin. But they don’t know that.

So while Rob didn’t think twice about offering to pull a bee stinger out of Emily’s armpit, I gotta think it was quite a leap of trust or desperation for Emily to agree.

A few moments later, Emily popped back into the snow cone, visibly relieved and stinger-free. She doused my snow cone with syrup, took my $5 and made change, and was back in business in a flash.


THE 2016 FAIR COURT ANNOUNCED! Sort of
So the real event of the day was the tryouts for next year’s Fair Court. Have I mentioned the Fair Court before? The three young women on horses that represent the Fair throughout the year? The cowgirls with long fluffy hair that I sort of stalk at parades and rodeos and on their Court Facebook page? And by “sort of” I mean I wave at them and write about them and get their autographs and try to contain my sheer giddy glee when they pose for a photo with me and my favorite llamas. You know, the Fair Court. I’m sure I’ve mentioned them.

From the rodeo in July.  See, I'm really not kidding.

Anyways….

The last day of the Fair every year is when the next year’s Court is chosen. The contestants spend the day being interviewed in private and in public. They make speeches, they answer impromptu questions, and they model and pose and smile. They also ride their horses, pretending they are in parades with balloons and umbrellas and raincoats (duh, it’s the Pacific Northwest; it almost always rains on our parade here).

My favorite part of the horseshow is when the girls do that superfast rodeo wave thing that looks really easy but I’m sure isn’t. In my infinite horsemanship wisdom, I judge all Fair Court Contestants most strictly on their rodeo wave. For me, it’s gotta be a wave, not just a hand held up. And it’s gotta be so fast it’s blurry. And it’s gotta be low because it just looks cooler that way.

Color Coded
This year there were six contestants vying for three Court spots: one queen and two princesses. For reasons I wish I understood, the contestants didn’t compete in numerical order. GAH!! On Day 10 of the Fair with my brain deep fried and in a sugar coma, keeping the numbers and names straight was just too much. So I resorted to taking notes by the color of the outfits.

Pre-tryouts line up of nervousness.  And I mean I was nervous
for them.  They all looked pretty calm considering.

My favorite contestant for the Speeches portion was Contestant Orangey Peach. When asked her favorite animal, she said “armadillo.” When asked where she wanted to visit outside the US, she said, “Madagascar.” Impromptu, unrehearsed, gut responses. Orangey Peach was original, quirky, and unexpected. I wonder if her second-favorite animal is a lemur?

I thought Orangey Peach did great in the horsemanship part, too. She was going so fast for her rodeo wave, her hat flew off!! Awesome! Yay super fast wave and flying hat!! Except, well, in later talking with a real horse person who knows these things, I found out that a flying hat is a very bad thing.

“The saying is, if you lose your hat your head better be in it.”

Yikes! That didn’t bode well for Orangey Peach. Sad face.

I also liked Contestant Sparkly Turquoise in the horse part. She handled all the parade obstacles well and she had a solid wave. Not quite as fast as Orangey Peach’s but low and waving, definitely.

Contestant Red (different outfit for horses, ouchy my head) impressed me in the horse part, too, when her horse decided it didn’t like umbrellas. Instead of forcing the horse or giving up and going on to the next obstacle, Red kept it together and simply restarted. Grace under pressure.

I thought Contestant Fuchsia (spelled very differently in my notes) was a natural at the speeches. She looked so at ease, I bet she actually remembers most of what she said.

Contestant White Shirt knew how to work a crowd. She was very comfortable being in front of people and smiling and posing. When her bio included being a cheerleader, I wasn’t the least bit surprised. Three cheers for White Shirt!

I was really impressed by how unflappable Contestant Brown was during her speech. Understandably, each of the girls lost her place once or twice during the memorized speeches. While other girls apologized or giggled nervously (I would have done both, probably through tears), Brown simply took a breath and paused as if for effect while she regrouped. I wish I had that poise when I was 16. Or 47.

And the winner is….
…not going to be revealed until February. Yes, seriously.

All that build up and it turns out all that was decided tonight was the Court itself. So we know which three girls are the 2016 Fair Court. YAY! But not which one is the Queen. Boo!

Nevertheless, congratulations Fuchsia (Mikaela), White Shirt (Serenity – my pick on Day 7!), and Sparkly Turquoise (Shaylee)!

Hi girls!  Let me introduce myself.  I'm Toni.  I'll be your
benevolent stalker for the next year.  Just ask Missy, Tessa,
and Brooke.  They'll fill ya in.  

Apparently it used to be done this way forever. And then it changed in 2011. And now it’s changing back. Oh my head.

In any case, the Fair Court Adult People will be working with Mikaela, Serenity, and Shaylee over the next 6 months. They will get to know them and better assess their gifts and skills and such beyond just one very long day of intense scrutiny.

Then on Saturday, February 6 (yes, it is already on my calendar), there will be an Official Coronation and the 2016 Fair Court Queen will be announced. I have cowboy boots now so you KNOW I will be attending. Because that’s what good stalkers do.  And by good I mean benevolent.  Really, I'm not scary. I'm friendly.  Maybe a little quirky but harmless, I promise.


Maybe next year they will train them to make letters with their hooves
We decided to make one final pass through the Llama Greenway just cuz. It was dark and most of the llamas and alpacas had been loaded up and were well on their way home. A few, though, were staying the night since some of the owners find it a lot easier to leave the Fair with their animals when there are no bleachers or straggling llama llovers to contend with. Oops.

As we neared the Greenway, I saw a bunch of green and red lights doing a disco show in one of the pens. Occupied pens. Occupied with alpacas. Then I noticed there was music playing. And there were three people sitting off to the side in camp chairs giggling.

“Wait…is that the Village People?!?” I asked nobody in particular as I watched the lights dance all over the surprisingly placid camelids.

“Yep!” More giggles. “I bought the lights from one of those booths. We’re not taking our guys home until tomorrow so we’re just hanging out here people watching.”

Because what could be more entertaining after 10 days of working the Fair than watching people try to process seeing alpacas being serenaded by the Village People complete with disco lights? Brilliant! If I had had a sweatshirt, we would have stayed (and danced) a lot longer.

And we thought the baboon in the monkey show was famous
So apparently there was mostly undetected greatness at the Fair today. A friend of ours detected it. We didn't see it ourselves but we trust the source. Especially since the source confirmed the greatness with the greatness itself.

Do you recognize this guy?

Thanks for sharing your picture, Martti!

He apparently was at the Fair all day and pretty much nobody recognized him.

Our friend and his wife debated all afternoon whether or not it was really him. The husband is a movie buff so he was sure it was. The wife was undecided. I mean, really, why would an award-winning Hollywood actor come spend the day at our Fair eating Hawaiian Shave Ice?? Well, OK, Emily and Hannah do make a mean snow cone, and judging from the background in the photo and the quantity of snow cone left, he bought his treat from the Dynamic Ice Duo. But still.

Our friend happened to walk out of the Fair at the same time as he did so they struck up a brief conversation.

"It sure must have been nice to walk around the Fair and not be recognized, huh, Mr. Malkovich?"

"Yeah, it really was."

Turns out his daughter lives in Portland (thanks for the sleuthing, Rob!) so maybe we'll be seeing more of him.  Or maybe we already have and had no clue.  Incognito on, Mr. Malkovich!



Fair Day Data

• Total walking logged on my pedometer: 2.84 miles 
• Time at which we saw today’s first set of Magic Brooms being carried around: 4:15pm
• Re-entry hand stamp:  extraordinarily inky tractor that I ended up wearing everywhere including my left thigh

Fair Food Feast Parade ~ The Finale

Well, here it is. The final parade.  I wish I had had better food for my last day.  The first two entries were sort of a bust.  But it ended well.  Very well.  All in all, I have no regrets.  Nothing I wanted went uneaten.  Except a Caesar salad.  Why oh why are there no Caesar salads glopped with tons of fattening dressing at the Fair?  Sigh.

Garlic fries from the Greek vendor.  Last year they rocked.
This year they were cold and limpy.  BOO!!!!

Hawaiian Dog from Boppin' Bo's.  Bo should stick to elephant
ears.  This was so disappointing!  It tasted like a Ball Park Frank
and the bun fell apart.  The pineapple was good but sticky.  Blah.

Last Smasher!  Back to where I started with the Northwest Berry.
One of my favorite finds of the Fair this year.  I might stalk
them to see if I can get some off-season Smashers...

Thanks for the abundant syrup, Emily!  And hope your bee
sting is better.  

Buttery, salty corn.  Oh, how I love this corn.

The last corn dog.  In honor of the earrings I wore the other day
I decided to skip the ketchup.  Old school.

The Grand Finale.  Our Last Day of the Fair
Ceremonial Deluxe Elephant Ear from Boppin'
Bo's.  Fried doughnut dough with butter, cinnamon, sugar,
strawberries, vanilla ice cream, and whipping cream.
Rob and I shared it.  I love this tradition.