In which we attend the Fair

Because that is the primary reason why people from here want to be home for the 12 days of fun ending on Labor Day, the Minnesota State Fair.

It looked like it was going to be a horrible day, a day when without question no bicycling could occur.  It even looked like it might be so horrible that even a couple of hours outdoors on the Fairgrounds could not occur.

I was watching the radar and even though rain was absolutely inevitable there appeared to be a slight chance that the rain would be brief and that we might break out through the other side to only unpleasant with perhaps not very much actual precipitation.  I watched AccuWeather which features a minute by minute forecast and after a while we got to a no precipitation for the next 120 minutes screen so we dropped pretty much everything and went for it.

It is a tiny bit strange being on the the grounds when conditions are anything other than sweltering and it took us some time to adjust.  Eventually we tried the shrimp place we like by the horticulture building and then started to filter on down towards the hog barn.  We passed through the DNR building on the off chance that I might know someone.

It has been four years.

But out in back I got a before the end of the Fair photo of the newest trash sculpture.

I think this is called Lepus ex Machina or some such thing.  Rabbit emerging from the machine.

I applaud the whole annual make some sort of art out of stuff pulled out of the public waters of the state but on the other hand this is to me the least visually interesting of all of the ones I have seen.

C.

We went down to see the state's largest boar.  I had been warned via text from TCWUTH that this year's largest boar was disappointingly not large.

She was right.

F.

For example, to demonstrate how large he clearly was not, for the entire time we were there he was standing up.  Most years it is a major event when the big pig even so much as rolls over.  He WAS STANDING UP.  About 800 pounds, a big pig maybe for this year, but, in context, disappointingly not very large at all.

We had a slight rain scare and were heading generally in the direction of the parking lot.  TOPWLH had a site on the southeastern edge of the grounds that she wanted to at least visit.  The shortest route from where we were to that spot was a diagonal through the Horticulture building.

And it turned out to be a fun detour.

The people who sold us (and planted) the BigNewTree are also hugely into the business of Christmas trees.  Here is their entry into the white pine category. 

They won second prize.  TOPWLH commented on looking at the white pine entries that making a Christmas tree out of a white pine is completely wrong.  The white pine is a majestic creature, pruning it to the demands of a less than $100 sale to be placed inside someone's home for two or three weeks in December just is NOT RIGHT for such a great tree.

She made the comment that it wasn't the right thing to do with a white pine and the nearest person to her, just a random passerby, immediately and enthusiastically agreed.

Still, we are happy for them for winning the prize.

Nearby was crop art.  It turns out that pi Day 2015 is a huge, HUGE pi day, a pi day pretty much like no other.  Next year on March 14 at 9:26:53am the numbers will align in a way which we have never seen before and will never, ever see again.

I got that information from crop art.  I am disappointed that Carolyn's art, despite it's startlingly important message, received only a fourth prize as art.

We were still in horticulture.  Here is the first prize for this year for Beacon apples.

TOPWLH is going to try to gather up a similar sample size of the fruit falling from our backyard Beacon.  She thinks, and I agree, that we can easily match that array.

We started heading for the exit.  It was starting to get dark.  The rain seemed to have passed but how much fun can two people have in Falcon Heights anyway?  We have never stopped here before but on the way we passed the Gold Country exhibit.  We stopped this time.

There just isn't any comment necessary.  The writing on the wall clearly demonstrates that at least in the lifetimes of any person claiming to be a Gopher fan the most successful team as measured by national championships is the women's hockey team.

11 years season ticket holders.

We headed home.

Over there by the trash barrel in front of the Monkey Maze is TOPWLH.

But we weren't out of the grounds yet and I wanted one last snack item, the walleye cakes at Giggles.  They had a band playing in the back.

We ended up staying for the entire show, about two more hours after we arrived.

They call themselves the Hottinger Blues Band.  They are a bunch of garage and bar band guys who have never given up, they still want to play, and after a lifetime of practice they play really well.

Then it turned out that we had a shirt tail relationship to some of the people who were there because they are friends and relatives of people in the band.  Specifically a girl who was a regular on our softball teams was there as a friend/family.  It turns out that her father went to high school with three guys in the band.

This led to a post concert nice moment of hey, how you doing, great to see you and like that, all of which was completely sincere and truthful.  It was great to see them.

Most importantly, the band was completely, completely outstanding.  We obtained information from the band's family and friends about the next time we can expect to see them (Saturday after Thanksgiving) and we will be there.

We headed for home and I didn't notice this, I dunno, being, until we were inside the garage at home.  A tag along toad.

We left him in the garage to his own devices.  I hope he makes it back to toad world okay.

When we started out the weather looked absolutely awful but it ended up being one of the greatest days we have ever had at the 12 days of fun ending on Labor Day.