original post: August 29, 2006 ("State Fair")

I went to the Minnesota State Fair yesterday with one of my BFF's, Debbers. She had been there since 8:00AM, or something like that, and I met her and Mary (a WS co-worker of ours) at the Miracle of Birth barn at 2:15PM to begin my only day of hecticness at the fair this year. Thank God--I can only take so much of the fairgrounds before I turn into a people-hater....wait a tick, too late for that. I already hate too much. Anyhoo...since I didn't eat breakfast or lunch yesterday in anticipation of the great food at the fair, I insisted we head straight to Andy's Garage for our 'annual' meal of Philly cheesesteak sandwiches and French fries. I say annual because Deb called it our annual event, of which we have done only last year. So it is a new annual event, but nevertheless, it is now our State Fair tradition. We really need to find new friends or something--we spend too much time together! :)

Like always, the sandwich and fries were excellent--I was famished! I didn't have anything to drink, since I was saving myself for the all-you-can-drink-milk truck by the exit. I made my first witty comment of the day at this point: birth control should be free to everyone, because there were WAY too many people at the fair who have been allowed to reproduce. For every 100 wastes-of-space humans, there was one decent one! And laser tattoo removal people would make a killing at the fair---TONS of ugly, gross tattoos on ugly, gross, flabby skin. But I digress.

After we ate, Mary left to go to work, and Deb and I continued our quest for the perfect fair foods. Next stop: the U of M building, so Deb could check in on her interns. Finding them alive was a relief, enough so that we went and next got some cheese curds----the best fair food ever! They never fail to amaze me. Delicious! Deb had a root beer, I had a Diet Coke to drink--they were too salty to not have a beverage.
Now that were had some food in our bellies, we took a while to walk around and take in all the sights. We walked over to the Leinie Lodge and the Bandshell---no one was performing. Deb and I went over to the Empire Commons building--the Dairy building--and looked at the Princess Kay of the Milky Way butter sculptures--always a crowd pleaser! Next, back to the Miracle of Birth center, where we found out that the cow who had been birthing a calf when I arrived at 2:15PM gave birth to the biggest calf of the fair so far: 115 lbs! But the best part was as we were walking into the building--Frank Vascallero and Amelia Santeniello were walking through the fair gates, and Deb nearly peed. She loves Channel 4 and all of their anchors! We walked around and looked at the newborn calves, lambs, and piglets--too cute! After this, we went up to the Grandstand to see what kind of crap they were selling. I bought an awesome panoramic poster of Princes Street in Edinburgh--my old stomping grounds--and Deb bought some golf towels for family members. While we were upstairs, you could hear the Steve Miller Band doing soundchecks for their show that night, and while we were downstairs, I swooned over Matt Garza and Boof Bonser, who had an off-day and were at the Fairgrounds--I nearly ran right into them! How exciting! They were like my own version of Frank and Amelia!

We started to lose our steam by this point, and I wanted one last morsel of food from the fair. I decided to try something new: Hot Dish on a Stick, from the Ole and Lena booth by the entrance to the Midway. It was tater tots, meatballs, and batter, lined up on a stick and deep fried, served with cream of mushroom soup for dipping. Basically, tater-tot hotdish on a stick! It was alright--I thought the batter was a little sweet--but I was glad I tried it. Deb got a skin-on footlong weiner for her last treat of the day, then it was off to the milk truck for all-you-can-drink milk. I had about 3 glasses of milk--but it was 2% only. Deb had some chocolate milk--I hate chocolate milk--and then we went to the bus and made our way back to the U. I nearly fell asleep from all the milk and tots in my stomach, but it was worth it.

Overall, the fair was perfect yesterday--not too crowded, since the weather wasn't the greatest, but plenty of freakish people to stare at, and plenty of great food! My feet were filthy, I somehow had syrup on my shins, but I had my fill and was happy.

Until next year!