By NATALIE SACKET
Columnist
Food! Rides! Prizes! Smelly people! Germs! What do all of these glorious things combine to create? The fair! In honor of the Oklahoma State Fair, open until Sunday, I thought I’d compose a list of reasons, in my FAIR opinion, why the fair is the best and worst place to be. This past weekend I attended a smaller county fair. While it wasn’t as majestic as the state fair, it still gave me a taste (literally) of all the wonderful and terrible things that occur at the fair.
The Good:
- There’s more fried food than you could possibly imagine.
- People-watching. (Depending on the people, this could be on either the good or bad list.)
- Dozens of spinning rides.
- There’s all manner of strange food concoctions. Anything unhealthy you could possibly imagine has probably been attempted at some fair or another. Donut hamburgers? Done. Fried Coca Cola? Done. Salad on a stick? Done. Fried butter? Done. (As Paula Deen praises the heavens.) Squirrel gravy over biscuits? Done. (Though this one should probably be on the bad list.)
- You might win a prize! Take that, you rigged game!
Now, for the bad:
- “Good” reasons 1, 3, and 4 combined, which can lead to all manner of terrible outcomes.
- Screaming children.
- Screaming adults.
- Crying children.
- Crying adults.
- To sum up those four, anything screaming and crying … Including the rickety old death-traps called rides that are barely holding on with a few ragged screws and bolts. (Do NOT take a physics class. You will forever be terrified by the impossibility of these rides functioning safely.)
- That prize you won? Your only competitor was a 5-year-old. Now you have a stuffed animal and she doesn’t.
Whether you choose to focus on the good or the bad, the fair can be a wonderful time to make some great memories with good friends, and that random smelly guy you sat next to on the ferris wheel.