The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

County Fair Season

Somewhere between the last half of summer and first half of fall…lies County Fair Season. So, after a 25+ year absence, I decided to pay a visit to a county fair. Furthermore, as it was Senior Day (55+), I was able to get into my county’s fair for free! I choose a Tuesday early afternoon for my visit to minimize the children factor at the event. County fairs are the essence of Americana. You can find an extremely diverse assault to your sensibilities and taste buds. In fact, a visit to the county fair is truly the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The Good

It’s a lot easier and more entertaining to talk about the bad and the ugly. But, that would do an injustice to the good of county fairs. Basically, the good is the kids and the animals. I do not mean the screaming brats consuming sugar and riding rides. I mean the working kids. Typically, the 4H kids. The ones raising, training and showing animals. And, there are lots of animals. I saw cows, horses, pigs, goats, sheep, llamas, alpacas, rabbits, chickens, and turkeys. No matter what sarcastic things I may say later in this post, kids working with animals is good stuff…

Just to ruin my attempt at being positive, please allow me two negative animal comments (see pictures below). First, why chickens? Why would you choose chickens to be your thing? They have no personalities and mostly look alike. You feed them, raise them, kill them, and eat them. We do not need chicken contests. Second, what’s up with the goat below. There were several of these goats. They had no ears. Naturally, I found them to be creepy.

The Bad

There are so many choices here. But, I will limit my discussion to two BADS…the rides and the food.

For full disclosure, I do not like most rides. About 27 years ago, I was on a Thomas the Tank Engine ride with my very young daughter. The ride malfunctioned. Sending us on a wild and life threatening death spin. Thankfully, the operator stopped the ride early and extracted my daughter and me. Point being…even the tamest appearing rides are a potential death trap. Do you think the carnies that maintain the rides have advanced mechanical degrees? Furthermore, if things go wrong, these carnies can not be held responsible. They will just change their names and hide in the mountains of West Virginia until the heat dies down. The rides are dangerous, but the food is worse…

Let’s do the food in Olympic fashion. The bronze medal for bad fair food is the elephant toes. Now, I suspect it’s really the same thing as the classic elephant ear…just a different shape. But, do we really need another elephant appendage deep fried in sweet batter and dunked in powdered sugar. For the silver medal, I selected the pizza cone. Who hasn’t said, “boy, my pizza would be so much better if you rolled it up and made it look like an ice cream cone.” A sight only available in a county fair.

Mercifully, I did not consume the bronze and silver medalists. However, when I decided upon the gold medal winner in crappy fair food, I was committed to eat it for the good of the blog. Without further ado, I give you the gold medal winner…

That is NOT the classic corn dog. Rather, that is a Snickers bar dipped in sweet batter, deep fried, and rubbed with powdered sugar. If you don’t like Snickers, they will also perform this abomination on Twinkies, Oreos, or Milky Ways. If you ask how many calories are involved, you just should NOT try it. In all honesty, it was not as bad as I thought it would be. But, I will not recommend it to my readers.

The Ugly

Please allow me to define “ugly” in this context. When I say ugly, I mean something really strange that struck my interest for some reason. As my first example, I give you the farm crop competition. I guess I can understand something like a biggest pumpkin contest. But, is there truly enough difference between feed corn and cherry tomatoes to award ribbons? I guess there is…

If that is not an odd enough for you, try pulling some soybeans or hay out of the ground, throw a bunch on the table, and declare it a contest???

My favorite “UGLY” of the day was an easy decision. How could you beat racing pigs. Not just racing pigs, but racing pigs on a track with a water element in the middle. I sh&t you not…

The pigs were great. Some pigs reluctantly ran into the water. But, the smart ones gave a great leap to cover half the distance in the air. Sadly, there was no wagering involved in these contests.

Wrap It Up

So, that is my salute to the county fair…the good, the bad, and the ugly. I also managed to attend the harness racing and played a couple midway games. Not surprisingly, both activities were a complete waste of my money. I also wanted to dedicate this post to my good friend, Queen Connie. She was a “pre-1980” queen of the Muskingum County Fair and a long time advocate for the GOOD in county fairs. Anyway, county fair season is almost over. If this post has inspired you to revisit this big slice of Americana…you better do it soon. Have a wonderful day. PT

I hope you have enjoyed “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” on Traveling with PugsleyTonks.

If you like that bit of rural Americana, do not forget this past post… https://travelingwithpt.com/is-johnny-appleseed-a-big-deal/

It’s not too late for you. Fairfield, Ohio, County Fair runs October 9-15, get there now https://www.fairfieldcountyfair.org/