Today the 2003 version of the Minnesota State Fair a.k.a. The Great Minnesota Get Together kicks off. People come from all over the state and even from all over the country to attend the twelve day event and from now until it ends the local media will be saturated with coverage of the State Fair. You won't be able to pick up a newspaper (I just can’t get enough of that Farley), turn on a radio, or watch thirty seconds of the local TV news without hearing about it. Your coworkers will talk endlessly about it, droning on and on about all the food they consumed and wondering when you're going. It will soon be all Fair all the time.
God I hate it. Yes I hate the State Fair. Actually I don't have anything in particular against the State Fair. Generally speaking I hate all fairs. County fairs, state fairs, diversity fairs, job fairs you put the name fair behind something and I hate it. And lest you dismiss me as a cynical post modernist who dislikes fairs because of their middle class bourgeoisie banality let me assure you that I hate the hip Uptown Art Fair just as much. Don't even get me started on my hatred for the Minnesota Renaissance Festival. It features the highest density of freaks and geeks imaginable. Why can't we revive the Black Plague and have it sweep through the Renaissance Festival and all those who participate in the nonsense?
In fact I'll expand my spite beyond fairs to include all festivals (which damn near every city and town in Minnesota feels a need to put on), carnivals, circuses, and parades. Why do I despise them all so?
Let's start with the food. Overpriced, fried crap. Every year people who otherwise have decent tastes in food delude themselves into believing that cramming cheese curds, corn dogs, and fried Snickers down your gullet until you're just about ready to hurl (and unfortunately past that point for some) is an enjoyable way to spend a day.
And then there are smells. The wafting aroma of fried crap, cotton candy, rotting garbage, overflowing porta potties, stale beer, and BO fills your nostrils the minute you set foot into one of these events. Throw in the odor of animal manure and the added effects of hot humid weather over two weeks and you've captured the essence of the Minnesota State Fair.
And bring on the crowds. Crowds of sweaty, smelly, pushy, sticky, fleshy, pressing people all trying to get somewhere fast without having any idea where they're going. Parents pushing strollers the size of the Apollo lunar rover oblivious to anyone in their path. Families so grossly overweight that they've got smaller families orbiting around them. Idiots jabbering into their cell phones while trying to walk and chew gum, failing miserably at all three.
In late August when the temps can sometimes linger in the low 90’s with high humidity, the State Fair is about the closest you can come to the squalor of the Third World without leaving Minnesota. It’s like a virtual slums of Calcutta experience.
But what about all the fun you can have at a fair you ask? Fun? The midways consist of lame rides, rigged games, and trashy prizes. The one thing I used to enjoy about the State Fair was the freak shows. The barkers trying to lure you in to see the Lobster Boy or the Snake Lady. Now that was entertainment. But in a pique of political correctness the powers that be banished the freak shows from the Fair some years ago. The one thing I really liked. Gone.
The other thing that I used to enjoy was Machinery Hill. Big honking tractors, enormous combines, and all the latest in farm implements. That too is now a thing of the past.
As much as I hate it I'll probably find myself at the State Fair at some point this year to see some radio personalities (and Dave Thompson) if nothing else. I'll check out the animal barn, "Look at the size of that hog's....", and hit the beer gardens to maintain my sanity.
Oh I'll go to the Fair all right. As a Minnesotan I almost have to. But damnit I won't like it.
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