You don’t see that everyday

By Dave Churchill (Contact) | The Daily Journal

Published Friday, August 31, 2007

People either feel the appeal of the State Fair – or they don’t. Those who get it, the kindred spirits, understand right away when you tell them you spent a hot summer day at the fair.

Those who don’t tend to curl their lip and say something like, “Oh, the State Fair. That might be fun. Maybe.”

It’s the same sort of reaction that the Renaissance Festival gets. Except that the State Fair is better.

Where else can you walk in the gates at 8 a.m. and be eating big, greasy gobs of fried cheese curds at 8:05?

Where else can you get macaroni and cheese on a stick? The kids love it, probably because they aren’t wondering about what the vendor had to do to get macaroni and cheese to stick to a stick.

Where else can you get salmon on a stick? Or walleye? Or a pickle? Or a deep-fried Snickers? In fact, where else can you get a deep fried Snickers of any sort – stick or non? And where else do you see a restaurant with the legend under its name, “Absolutely nothing on a stick?”

Fact is, you don’t see that stuff every day.

The State Fair is not all about food, although it often seems like it.

It is also the place where you can see the state’s biggest pig – this year, a 1,040-pound whopper who proudly demonstrated his weight-gain technique to thousands of admirers daily: Lie around and do absolutely nothing.

For town kids, it’s a rare chance to be within feet — inches, even — of real, live dairy cattle. It’s a chance to watch a champion Black Angus bull snort and stamp with a ring in its nose while it is primped with hair spray and a tiny comb for the big judging.

It’s a chance to find out whether earless goats were born that way. They were.

You just don’t see that stuff every day. Did you know you can buy one of those gigantic, Department of Transportation-type snow plows, used, for about $25,000? It was a State Fair special, offered by some used-truck dealer. We’re talking wing plow, salt-spreader, the whole nine yards. And believe me, it was tempting. There were a lot of guys looking at that plow and thinking hard.

You don’t see that every day.

But it might just be a more common sight, at least out in these parts, than the huge crowds. Seas of people wash back and forth across the fairgrounds, up and down the streets and around the barns and rides and food stands.

Get a beverage, take a seat in the shade and sit back. The people-watching opportunities never end and they never cease to amuse. Sit in one place for an hour and you never see the same people parade by twice.

You don’t see that every day.

We won’t see it many more times this year, because the fair closes Monday. There’s still time to go. And if you miss it this year, it will be back next year – same time, same place.

Journal publisher Dave Churchill’s column runs on Fridays. This column appeared in a previous edition of The Journal.