Minnesota State Fair: Part 3

Because of this massive three part blog post, I feel like I have been at the state fair for the last five days.  I assure you I have not.  I am actually back in Buffalo.  Tomorrow I am heading to Baltimore for a wedding, and then finally I can hunker down at home.  This has been a great summer.

The Oddities

Not everything in this final state fair post is odd.  Mostly, this post represents a collection of the uncatogorizable odds and ends I found at the fair this year. 

I’ll start with the least odd, and move on to the freakish from here.  I happen to know a knitting superstar.  Her name is Susie Farnum, and every year she wins multiple ribbons for her beautiful creations.  No day at the state fair would be complete without a visit to see Susie’s knitted swag. 

Susie probably designed and knit all of this stuff up one evening while watching television- she is crafty that way.

I like to spend a few minutes in the Horticulture building looking at gigantic pumpkins and prize winning seeds.  I am always amused by the concept of vegetable competitions.  For example:

I hope that the grower of the red ribbon corn is ashamed of himself.  That corn is an embarrassment.  Just look at it!  I think I can hear the blue ribbon corn laughing. 

I discovered something new at the fair this year, the Telvac Personality Analysis Machine.  This highly scientific machine uses cutting edge technology to analyze the customer’s handwriting.

 

You can tell the technology is working by the hundreds of blinking red lights covering the surface of the machine.  Once the technician has inserted your handwriting sample, the machine performs it’s mathematical wonders, and a personalized computer printout reveals the inner workings of your soul.  I was amazed to discover I am "generous to a fault" and "occasionally mischievous".  Just think of all of the money wasted on therapy by millions of Americans who have never heard of The Telvac Personality Analysis Machine.  What a shame. 

And now for the weirdest, oddest, freakiest Minnesota State Fair exhibit, The Butter Princesses.

No, your eyes do not deceive you, this is the face of a a high school senior, carved into 90 lbs of butter.  The exhibit is called Princess Kay of the Milky Way.  Each girl is the daughter of a dairy farmer.  The exhibit consists of a refrigerated, revolving glass case containing one block of butter for each day of the fair.  During the day, spectators can witness the carving of a Butter Princess.  It is truly bizarre.  My favorite part of this exhibit are the plain blocks of butter designated to be carved later on in the week.

.

Each block of butter represents a lovely lady, aching to be released from her creamy prison. 

And best of all?

The princess gets to take her sculpture home.

How awesome would that monstrosity look taking up the bottom half of the refrigerator?

So that’s it people!  The Great Minnesota Get Together.  I hope you enjoyed your tour.  If you ever have the opportunity to attend, do not miss your opportunity to see the fair.  It is pretty much the greatest place on earth. 

I will leave you with a portrait of the prize winning baked goods.

God Bless the great state of Minnesota.

Minnesota State Fair: Part 2

The Food

Please don’t judge me too harshly for what you are about to read.  I ate a lot at the state fair this year, but most of this food was shared, and very few things were finished.  I was at the fair for about six hours.  Six glorious hours.

First, a few tips on dining at the fair:

The food at the fair is plentiful, fattening, and most often found on a stick.  The best thing you can do for yourself is arrive at the fair hungry.  Show up hungry, but pace yourself.  Don’t get crazy at the beginning.  You have a long day of eating ahead and you don’t want to ruin the fair experience with an early morning bellyache.  Be cool.  Drink plenty of fluids.  I find that Diet Coke suits most of my fair beverage needs.  When you think you are full, don’t give up!  If you have been eating sweet, try switching to salty.  Thirty years of the Minnesota State Fair have taught me that the perfect time for cheese curds is when you think you might die if you eat another mini donut. 

I started my fair day with a delicious Pronto Pup.  A Pronto Pup is a corn dog.  It is also the undisputed favorite fair food of Minnesotans.  Some Minnesotans get all huffy about the difference between a regular corn dog and a Pronto Pup.  Me, I believe that if it looks like a corn dog, and tastes like a corn dog, well, it’s a corn dog.  That being said, I went out of my way to start the day with a Pronto Pup.  It was good.

 

I don’t want any lip from the mustard police about the ketchup on my Pronto Pup.  Ketchup is delicious.  I don’t understand why you people (Chicago, I’m looking at you) take it personally when I enjoy my hot dog with ketchup.  Can’t we all just get along? 

I was still a bit hungry after The Pup.  Show up hungry, remember?   I decided to take a chance on The Pickle Dog stand. 

Hooray for the Pickle Dog! 

Cream cheese + pastrami + pickle = pure scrumpsh. 

A Pickle Dog calls for a frosty Diet Coke. 

I had never had a Pickle Dog before as I tend to stick to the basics (food wise) at the fair.  A few years ago Sam and I bought some alligator bites (tastes like chicken), and it was then that I learned that I don’t really care about the exotic fair foods.  Every year all of Minnesota gets riled up about some new fair food or another-  a few years ago it was the deep fried Twinkie.  This year, I am horrified to report, all of Minnesota is talking about Hot Dish on a Stick.  (Hot dish is Minnesotan for casserole.)

For the sake of the blog I had intended to try the Hot Dish on a Stick, but I blanched upon seeing the retched thing.  It looks like a corn dog, but it contains potatoes and ground beef and whatever else is in "hot dish".  After hovering around the booth nervously for a few minutes I realized that Hot Dish on a Stick is served with a side of cream of mushroom soup for dipping.  I ran like hell.

Here, a mother attempts to force feed Hot Dish on a Stick to her innocent, infant son:

Hot Dish on a Stick reminds me of another mind boggling Minnesota State Fair vender, the all you can drink milk booth.

WTF!  Nobody over the age of four months should be gorging themselves on milk.  EEW!  eww eww eww eww eww eww eww eww eww EEEEEEEEEEEW.  All you can drink milk!  The mere mention gives me the shivers.  Hot Dish on a Stick, followed by all the milk you can drink.  EEEEEWWW!

Quickly, on to something else…..

My very favorite fair food is the Tom Thumb mini donuts.  Mini Donuts are theatrical and delicious.  I have always loved watching the mini dog nut machines.  Because it’s Minnesota, and Minnesotans are nicer than normal folks, the mini donut guy took the glass casing off the machine so I could take some good pictures.  Thanks, Tom Thumb donut guy!

Once the little donuts make their way out of the river of grease they are liberally sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.  For $3.50, I received a bag of 16 warm, bite sized donuts.

It is my dream to one day own a Tom Thumb mini donut machine.

I can’t believe how much more food I have to tell you about.  An absurd, embarrassing, horrifying, fantastical amount of food left to go!

Chocolate covered marshmallow.  Eh.  It was okay.  Good thing it was only 50 cents.

At this point I had been at the fair for about four hours and I was seriously slowing down.  Time for fried cheese curds!

Fried cheese curds are pretty much exactly what they sound like- delicious.  Mozzarella cheese, battered and deep fried.  Curds are a Minnesota State Fair staple and they are must be eaten annually, if only for the sake of tradition.

Finally, in one Herculean burst of fair enthusiasm, Mary and I decided we needed some garlic fries to finish off the day of eating.  Garlic fries are so wrong. 

So wrong, in such a very very right way. 

I blame the garlic fries for the fact that no matter how many showers I took over the following days, I could not feel clean. 

Damn you, garlic fries.

Whoa.  That is a lot of food at the state fair.  I did it for you, internet.  I wanted you to see.  All in all, this was a banner year for eating at the fair. 

Stay tuned for Part 3: Fair Oddities.  (Butter heads)

Minnesota State Fair: Part 1

When I die and go to heaven (presuming God forgives me for this), I just might find myself at the Minnesota State Fair.  I effing LOVE the fair.  Thanks to my awesome work schedule, I usually find myself in Minneapolis in late August, perfect timing to hit The Great Minnesota Get Together.  Yesterday, along with Lois, Mary, and Kathleen, I hit the fair- and I hit it haaaaaard.

There is a lot to tell you about the fair.  I intended to do one gigantic post, but I realized I can’t cram the entire fair all into one blog entry.  Today, we will be highlighting the farm animals.  (The real star of the fair is the food, but I still have a stomach ache.  I am not ready to relive the eating experience yet.  Maybe tomorrow.)

The Animals

There are thousands of farm animals at The Fair.  To me, (a city girl) all cows look the same, but apparently this is not true.  Some cows are extra fabulous.  The fabulous cows receive ribbons.  Here is the very best dairy cow in Minnesota:

Coming soon to a Fuddrucker’s near you:

This poor dude is the Best Beef cow in Minnesota.  Rough break, buddy.

I find sheep very funny.  Sheep are cute and amazingly stupid.  For reasons I do not understand, the sheep wear little jackets at The Fair.  In their outfits, the sheep look like fuzzy little Klansmen.  I don’t think that sheep are racists, but I think it’s best to keep a close eye on them…….just in case.

Best Pig in Show:

The most popular animal exhibit is The Miracle of Birth Center.

The Miracle of Birth Center contains all manner of horrors.  The basic premise is that they fill a barn with preggers animals in the hopes that they will give birth during business hours.  Eww.  Seriously, eww.  On the other hand, this is the barn where they keep the baby animals, aka The Cutest Ones.  I have always felt wary of the Miracle of Birth barn.  I like the babies, but I am horrified by the "miracle"of birth.  All joking aside, I think it is a little strange that in order for a child to see a baby chick he also has to watch a calf fight his way out into the world.  It is just very intense. 

At first it is cute inside- real cute.  I wanted to slip a couple of these fuzzy chicks into my pocket.

Awwwwww.  Lambs! 

Aaaaw.

 

Heh.  Hi, little piglet. 

Having a snooze? 

You’re cute.

These people are watching a calf be born.  It would easy to avoid the carnage except for the television screens.  Just is case you can’t get close enough to the action, there are big screen teevees everywhere.  The Minnesota State Fair really wanted me to experience the miracle of birth.  I’m not going to lie, I felt violated.  Violated and confused. 

If you or a loved one have been violated by a state fair, please call 1-800-MIRACLE to speak to a counselor. 

Now that your appetite is ruined, stay tuned for Part 2 of The Fair: The Food.

1982

Thanks for the awesome haircut, mom.

Seriously.  Thanks a bunch. 

1985

For the last twenty one years, my mother has proudly displayed this picture of me on her mantle.

Let’s discuss it, shall we?

My mother claims this was my "concentrating" expression, which concerns me quite a little bit.  This photo is the "Perfect Storm" of embarrasing photos, and yet amidst all of the poor fashion choices, it is only my expression that still causes me to cringe.  As an adult, I am from time to time required to concentrate.  The lingering suspicion that this expression still exists in my repertoire is……worrisome.

Please note I am wearing a t-shirt with Mary Lou Retton’s signature across the stomach.  I just loved Mary Lou.  If my parents had allowed it, I probably would have worn the classic Mary Lou Retton, American flag leotard every day of 1984.  It’s a good thing I didn’t wear the leotard as I’m not sure it would have gone very well with my very favorite painters cap.  I particularly like how it is perched atop my head.  Notice the wide, perfectly flat bill. 

The glasses.  Those of you who know me know that I do not wear corrective lenses of any sort.  You know this because I am very proud of my Super Vision, and will brag about my unnaturally fine eyesight to anyone who will listen.  I wasn’t always so happy about my eyesight though.  Oh no.  In 1985 I decided that all of the cool and intelligent young ladies wore large, pale pink, plastic glasses.  In order to attain said glasses I had to convince my parents and an optometrist that I couldn’t see.  I began a month long campaign of squinting and whining about being unable to see the blackboard at school.  I’m sure the eye doctor was totally onto my scam, but bless his heart, he furnished me with this lovely pair of glasses.  When I was ten, I wanted to wear glasses.  By the time I was eleven, I had grown tired of the bespectacled look, and I callously abandoned my once beloved accessory.  Fortunately, the glasses phase was forever memorialized by this classic photo from Suzuki Camp, 1985.

I think the fact that I had to fake poor eyesight in order to wear those glasses is really all you need to know about ten-year-old Kate, or even thirty-one-year-old Kate.  I’m pretty sure the impulse that lead me to wear those glasses is still lurking around inside of me, threatening to humiliate my future children. 

Hee.

Links

I just noticed that a lot of the links in my sidebar were broken.  I think I’ve fixed the problem, so all y’all should have a look at some of the fun new blogs.

The Doctor, will see you now.  The Swedes might not have trisquits, but they have a sweet blog.  Lucy will soon be running away from her new brother.  The secret is in the mail.

Amateur Night

Yesterday night I arrived in Minneapolis, the motherland. 

Tonight, I followed Aaron’s lead, and we ended up in a tiki bar.    It was a move we would soon regret- it turns out we are too old to drink sweet rum drinks out of pineapples.  There was a period of about a half hour when our entire party was unexpectedly drunk and slap happy, but it was downhill from there.  The hangover resulting from "The One Eyed Willy" (my potent poison) set in about five seconds after the drink was gone.   Sadly, by eleven-thirty we were all feeling weathered by the tiki bar experience and we were forced to surrender to bedtime. 

Don’t get me wrong, the night was not a waste.  There was lots of howling laughter.  We may have been drinking like amateurs, but we are seasoned professionals when is comes to having fun. 

Here is a close up of the swizzle stick that came in my drink.  Tacky, but cute.

Tiki bar, you win.  I’m out like trout.

Self Googler

Yesterday, this comment was left on the original Alex Blumberg post:

Hello-
I grew up with Alex Blumberg. Apparently, he recently did a piece on "This American Life" about his dog killing my childhood pets. I just found this site by googling the name of his sister, because having people call me to tell me about the radio piece made me wonder what she was up to. It also got me really depressed thinking about my pets, but that’s a different story. His sister’s name, as it happens, is Kate, so "Kate Blumberg" got me here. I run into Alex every 5 years or so, and I will try to remember to direct him to your site. Sorry my projected time-frame is not very quick.
All the best,
Emily

………

Uh-oh……….and hooray!

It suddenly (and moronically) occurs to me that it’s quite likely that Alex Blumberg will eventually find this site.  In theory that was the entire point of the Alex Blumberg Experiment- that he would find this shrine, contact me and that we would fall into improbable love.  This plan amuses me, and I have had great fun sewing this thread through my blog.  To me this is a funny story I have created, inspired by a crush on an abstract person. 

It is a bit unsettling for me to consider the actual Alex Blumberg.  I have done practically no online investigation.  My version of Alex Blumberg is created entirely by what I have heard on the radio, and my own imagination.  It occurs to me that if he ever finds my blog, Alex Blumberg will instantly know much much more about me than I know about him.  Weird.   I’m feeling concerned about the high potential for embarrassment here.

I take comfort in the fact that the basic concept of the Alex Blumberg Experiment is sound.  In order for him to find this blog, he has to google himself.  Sure, it’s a bit embarrassing that I have created a shrine to a stranger, but come on, the guy sits around googling himself all day.  What an ego on that guy, geez.  See how that works?   I may be a goober for creating this situation, but he is also a goober for falling for the bait.  See?  My plan includes a face saving trap.  I may be lame, but so are you.  This is an immature stance I realize, but faced with the prospect of a real live man confronting me with the damning evidence that is this website, I will take any small comfort I can get.

And lets say he does find the site.  Why do we google ourselves anyway?  Isn’t the secret hope of all self googlers that somewhere, out there in the internet, there is a secret shrine devoted to us?  Why else would we google our own name?  We are looking for unexpected information about ourselves.  We are looking for a glimpse at what other people see when they see us.  I hope that at the very least, Alex Blumberg will be flattered to discover that a perfect stranger, albeit a weirdo, saw fit to create one hell of an interesting google link.

Going to Hell

When I am in the mood to "get my God on", I opt for my neighborhood Unitarian Church.  Church for me is just a nice relaxing place to sing songs and feel consciously grateful to be alive.  I don’t really care for the whole fire and brimstone bit, and although I’m sure Jesus was a truly awesome dude, I’m a bit skeptical about the rising-from-the-dead section of Christianity.  The thing I like about Unitarians is that they are all lovity-love-love.  Unitarians are totally down with the gays (I love the gays), and they don’t get all YOU ARE GOING TO HELL every time you do something fun.   

So, from time to time I haul my hungover ass into the Unitarian Church near my house.  To be honest, I don’t really know what the Unitarians believe in or how they differ from say, a PFLAG meeting, but I find their services pleasant and joyful.  Plus, my Unitarian church has really good music. 

I can be as hippy-dippy-tra-la-la-glory-in-peaceful-loooooove, as the next gal, but even I had to roll my eyes when I noticed this plaque on the side of the church:

Yeah.  Thanks for clarifying that because I hear the Catholic Church down the road has a full arsenal of nuclear weapons underneath the alter. 

I imagine this sign was attached to the building in the late seventies by a circle of well intending, bell-bottom-wearing, organic-bean-curd-eating, stay-at-home caregivers.   In our troubled times, the sign seems comically earnest.

I have felt a shameful and constant urge to mock the sign- an urge that I could no longer resist. 

I attached this second sign in broad daylight on a very busy street.  I don’t feel so bad about poking a little fun at the Unitarians because I imagine they have a sense of humor- which is exactly why they get my business. 

I’m pretty wishy washy about organized religion, but I am certain I will be a lifetime member of The Church of Funny Shit. 

You Get What You Pay For

Meet Choakie, the 12 week old Golden Doodle I met in Sun Valley:

Choakie is half golden retriever, half poodle.  He is the cutest little dewd eh-vah.  He doesn’t yip or nip or jump up on people.  He just sits calmly, wagging his tail and looking adorable. 

Choakie is stunningly well behaved.  You see that leg in the middle picture?  The bare one in the tennis shoe with a blue sock?  That leg belongs to Choakie’s full time professional dog trainer.  There is an adult human who’s sole job in life is to train Choakie to be a good dog.  When I met Choakie, he and his trainer were standing outside of the grocery store so that Choakie could work on his social skills.  Choakie was learning how to meet people and pose for photographs without losing his cool.  He had all of the charm and enthusiasm, without all of the jumping and licking.  This is the best, most adorable, most fabulous puppy ever to grace the face of the earth.

They say money can’t buy happiness, but it sure as hell can buy you one very fine dog.