And Its Off To The Fair This Afternoon

Well, Maryann, daughter Sharon from Hampton, NH, grandson Sammy from Bellows Falls, Mary Kay next door and I headed off to the fair around 12:30. Beautiful, beautiful day and a big crowd there. We parked in the handicapped parking lot, so were near the gate. Mary Kay & Sammy drove down in her vehicle and got there before we did.

Bought our tickets and went through. Our neighbor, Becky Neopolitano was punching tickets at the gate. She was busy indeed, but has a good eye as she noticed us going in, even though we went in an adjoining gate and yelled "Hi." Great to be a Vermonter. We met Mary Kay and Sammy at the first Expo building where all the prize vegetables are and took a stroll through there. The guy was busy working on the Sand Sculpture, but I am sure will have it completed by the end of the week. As I said earlier, lots and lots of people.

By the way, before we went through the Expo Building, I had to go to the Mr. Sausage concession (Sorry Scott, didn't know you wanted one), however chose to get a Keilbasa (?? spelling) with peppers and onions as I don't trust the Hot Sausages and since they don't seem to have Root Beer, got a bottle of coke. I won't say what everybody else got as they might not appreciate it, but we did spread out a bit from the Pigs in a Blanket to Al's French Fries with cheese dip. Well, this got us started anyhow, because, after all, it was after 1 p.m. by now. While we were eating, Pat & Laurie Queor stopped by and chatted for a bit.

Maryann gets around very well in her power chair, but the crowds today were definitely a challenge. I followed for about a half hour, then just had to get off my feet and found a bench in one of the air-conditioned Expo Buildings. Its enjoyable to just watch the people go by. One lady got in an argument with Batman, not sure what it was all about, but I wasn't going to get involved.

Lots & lots of strollers and my youngest daughter mentioned to me when she came and sat down with me while I was outside People Watching, that she didn't ever remember going to the fair in a stroller. I told her that is probably because I don't ever remember our taking the kids to the fair when they were that young. When they got a little older, Maryann used to take them with our neighbor Theresa Gross. Back in those days we didn't buy our lunches, I believe Maryann & Theresa brought a picnic lunch and visited all the free exhibits with the Gross kids and our girls. I didn't used to go, but heard about it when I got home from work at night. They still had a great time without spending a lot of money.

Maryann still loves going through the crafts, quilts and photo buildings. Not that she buys anything, but does enjoy looking at things. In front of the building that has the photos, they usually have some interesting presentations from The Cabot Cheese Company. Today, they had some large oxen as well as some young ones and a lady was giving some information on them. Very interesting. The oxen were kind of rust colored and white and she said they were red holsteins. I had never heard of such a thing. I always thought holsteins were only black and white. She said in the old days farmers would hide them or get rid of them as it was thought there was something wrong with them because they weren't black & white. Anyhow she also explained how they trained them. Really passed the time for me while I was waiting for Maryann.

Met another neighbor with her son and his family and chatted again for a while. I'm not sure what day is Senior Citizens Day down at the fair, but suspect a lot of our old time Fairfax people will be there by then.

We had just one more stop to make when Maryann finished her tour and that was the Vermont Maple Building. Didn't get any doughnuts today, but did get a nice dish of Maple Cree Mee which tasted just great on this nice mid 80s day. We got home about 4:15 and both pretty tired, however, Sharon, Mary Kay and Sammy were still going strong. They planned to let Sammy ride on the midway with his all day $20 pass, then listen to Daughtry from outside the gates to the grandstand. It is now almost 9 p.m. and the last I heard from them is that they were waiting for a pre-show group to finish so they could at least hear Daughtry do one number.

As for pictures - Well, I brought my camera, but didn't want to antagonize anybody today. My daughters aren't big on pictures and I kind of would like to wait until I lose a little weight myself before someone points that thing towards me.

Another Year - Another Fair.