Only at the County Fair

When you live in a small, rural area, like we do, you learn to look forward to, and savor, even the most mildly entertaining events. For example, the Promenade, which consists of setting up lawn chairs on the front lawn of the high school on the day of Prom and watching all the couples arrive in their creative vehicles and their sparkling, sometimes risque, garb.
Well, I'd also say that our county fair fits into that category. I mean, it IS the county fair, right here in our little town, but of all county fairs I've ever been to, this one is kind of...well....puny. We look forward to it every year as a source of entertainment and an excuse to eat corndogs and funnel cakes, but the rides are straight out of the 60's, very limited, and yet the prices go up every year. I will give them this little bit of credit this year, though. For one thing, the carnies were actually not drunk this time, and were quite helpful with the little kids, which we all appreciate. Also, they replaced the "Country Gold" tour with a much better (IMHO) group on stage last night and a well known country singer tonight. I still say they need to, at least ONCE, have a rock band instead of, or in addition to, country.
But I digress. I don't want to make it sound like we don't enjoy the fair, we do. And this year we really couldn't have asked for better weather. After the scorching heat last year, and racing a tornado out of town the year before, this year was perfection.
With the hubs being out of town at a hunt, Ty and I picked up his friend Brayden and his mom and took off for the fair yesterday evening, arriving just in time to grab a corn dog and a lemon shake-up before it was time to buy wristbands and get on the rides. While the boys didn't play together as much as we thought they would, they did have their moments and had a great time.We spent a good portion of the evening with my sister in law, who had been abandoned by her nearly-teenage son and his friend, and we were casually chatting while Ty spun around on the airplane ride, when we saw the most indescribeably....wrong.....thing I've ever seen at the fair.
His name is Captain Cornelius, and my dear sister in law just couldn't resist hinting and nudging me with quips like, "Just think, you could put it on your blog and say something about what a great corn salsa you could make with it..." until I gave in and agreed to this:Yes, that is me, posing for a picture with Captain Cornelius, the life size, walking, talking ear of corn. The picture really doesn't do him justice, you've really got to see him full length to get it. The costume is so messed up, he had muscles on his KNEES.....and although I'm sure (I hope) it wasn't intentional....he was kinda.....well.....anotomically correct. Yeah. So, if you ever wondered whether or not I was exaggerating the level of "hick" to the town in which I live....wonder no more! This is photographic proof positive.

Moving right along....after last year's trip to the fair, which was Ty's first year riding rides, we definitely learned our lesson. Don't eat much before riding, and don't let him ride the same ride more than one time in a row without getting off and walking around a bit....especially not the swings.

Or, at least, we THOUGHT we learned our lesson. We were doing so well. We moved around from ride to ride, and even when Ty threw a fit about getting off, I stood my ground. I even let him ride the swings! I didn't realize, however, that last year they had two sets of swings, the small one and the regular one. Last year Ty rode the small set, and got sick when I made the mistake of letting him ride three times consecutively. This year, I didn't realize until the swings started spinning that there was no "small set" this year. This was the BIG swing. And Ty loved it! He did great, and I made him get off and go walking after his ride. I let him ride again with his cousin about an hour later, and he had an absolute blast. We were at the point in the evening where the ladies (me and Brayden's mom) were thinking it was about time to go and we'd let them ride another ride or two and then call it a night. Ty wanted to go on the Dragon ride with his cousin again, so I sent them on their way while we strolled behind.By the time we caught up, they were at the front of the SWING ride's line again. Well, I hadn't intended to let him ride it again, but it had been about an hour, and we were getting ready to leave, so why not, right?

If you ever ask yourself, "why not?" you should probably take that as a sign to hit the brakes, make a u-turn and run in the other direction.

Ty made it all the way through the ride, but I could tell when they stopped that something was seriously wrong and I made a beeline for his swing.....just in time to catch him depositing previously-owned corndogs on the carnie's boots. (who, by the way, was a fantastically good sport). (I imagine Ty felt something like THIS during the ride. And yes, that is actually Ty and his cousin on the left hand side of the picture.)

Suffice it to say that next year, Ty's rides on the swings will be limited to TWO. It was a long ride home, and then there was cleanup, and finally, blessed sleep. Today might have started better if in the midst of all this, I hadn't forgotten that the hubs was out of town and that I needed to set my own alarm. Ugh. Thank god for Ginny, who just happened to call me at 6:06 this morning to discuss her trip out here this afternoon....or I'd never have gotten a much needed shower this morning.

So, happy Friday, everyone! See you at the fair? (yes, that's snark, in case you were wondering...)