State Fair 2014

Last Friday we hit the 2014 Minnesota State Fair.  Not NEARLY as exciting for me this year because of the threat of rain.  I love the time I have to myself when I ride my bike up there early in the morning and find breakfast and do my own thing.  You can see some of the morning water below in the picture of Eryn in the racecar.  Unfortunately, I used an && in biking and hanging at the fair early and short circuited when I couldn't bike.  In retrospect, I could have just hauled my bike up there and rode from somewhere close, or even just parked up there really early and done my own thing for several hours without my bike.  It's nice to know I feel like my bike is a part of me, but I was less concerned about leaving my wife out of my early morning activities than my bike.  That might be pushing me close to the crazy I see in club members.

We debated going at all on Friday, but in the end I thought staying until the rain started at 5:00 on a workday I already had off was our best option for avoiding a horrible crowd.  Given they set the record the next day with almost a quarter million people, that was the right call.



Here you can see the rain has kicked in while people sing to Adele.  Eryn's in that picture.  To the right, zebra-ish umbrella.  I'm sitting under a fairly dry tree that accumulated 50 or so people as soon as it started to rain.  That was fine, until the guy came sauntering up with his lit cigarette and turned our tree shelter into a smoke-filled tree shelter.


It's appropriate to hold hands at the sing a long, but shoe choice is more important.  You can't sit and sing, so those shoes are entirely inappropriate.


Enjoy The Gambler at the Singalong.  I can't tell who's worse, the guy with the trachea voice or the kid screaming what seems to be nonsense.  But nonsense in tune.


And another song.  Full track.


HA!

I...

RICK...

ROLLED...

YOU!

Not much rolling - but you probably didn't realize you were going to listen to Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up!

I'm not a fan of the midway, but Eryn loves it and the rain stayed away long enough to enjoy the rides.


Bonus photo.  This one didn't make it to Facebook and it's my favorite from the fair, near the Giant Slide, shortly before we went to find Pinball on a Stick and play some Star Trek the Movie, Haunted House, and Siege pinball.  Maybe I should have taken my hat off.


On our way out we tried to swing past the crafts area to a.) avoid the downpour and b.) find grandma's scarfs.  We found the scarfs.  I also found this.  She didn't make this - it's from the 4H building.  I'm not sure what inspired it, but the only thing that comes to mind looking at it is Cartman having t-parties with his toys on South Park.


We managed to find free parking.  That was a pleasant bonus.  Given the ticket prices are huge and the midway ticket prices are huge, it's cool to save some money here and there, like on parking and on the half-used coupon book someone left for the taking at work (sometimes if you want something to go away, there are specific spots to put it to encourage taking - I've done it with computer games and books).  You didn't need a coupon for this tree - it was the cheapest thing at the Fair!