Ce Weekend

On Sunday we went to the Montgomery County Agricultural Fair. We decided to go because I guess I was feeling a little bit nostalgic for the Puyallup Fair. I have not been to the Puyallup Fair in probably six or seven years, maybe more. I remember as a child going every year. I think we may even got to take the day off school. I remember the rides of course - the roller coaster, the zipper, the black octopus, the teacups, the swings - playing the games and trying to win the most gigantic stuffed animals. I also remember the craft and collectible houses, the displays of fruits and vegetables, the gigantic vegetables, the fishing area and one of my all time favorites...the "as seen on tv" area with the demonstrations (cookware, cooking tools, ring cleaner, etc.)...this is where my early love for QVC came from! I remember the food, the YoungLife BBQ, elephant ears, the earthquake burgers (I never had one but amazing nonetheless) and of course the piece de resistance the fair scone. The best part about the food was going with Unyun because he always wanted to share everything so that we could try everything! I also remember the chameleons and gold fish. Remember, Heather, we would get the chameleons (they really were not chameleons but some kind of lizard) and let them run loose around the house in Mom's plant display. We always wondered where they went when they disappeared until Unyun told us they went in the vents and died or the cats got them! Why did we get them every single year?

So those are my memories of the Puyallup Fair and I thought we would start some memories of our own and the Montgomery County Agricultural Fair. It pales in comparison to the Puyallup but despite the excruciating heat we had fun. We had BBQ (a 5.5 on a scale of 1:10), we saw animals, there was a small "as seen on TV" exhibit, we enjoyed some rides and we had some laughs. It was not nearly as good as the Puyallup Fair but we had some memorable moments.

First, we unexpectedly saw a baby calf that was born less than two hours earlier. We saw signs for the milking area which I thought would be fun but next to the milking area was the birthing center. I walked in first and saw the rear of the cow with the tail hanging down and the placenta. It was disgusting so I told everyone to go around to the other side where the front of the head was. We went around and we saw the front of the mama cow and the calf. The calf was really cute and the boys sat on a bleachers to see the baby cow. The mama cow turned around and Aidan said "yew...what is that?" So I explained that when babies grow inside their mommies tummies they grow in a sac. He said, "that's disgusting. let's get out of here." We all agreed. The joys and lessons of life on the farm. Later, after we left, he asked "did you have that sac when I were born." Great...the Montgomery County Fair leads to lessons on birthing and babies!

Another memorable (G-rated) moment was when we watched the pig races. We got there 15 minutes early because the pig races draw a big crowd! There was a pig caller from North Carolina MCing and calling the pig races he was really funny and very southern. For each of the races he would select someone from the crowd to cheer for one of the four pigs/animals that raced and if your pig won you would get a prize. For the first race he picked Leo to cheer on the brown tagged pig and said "that little boy has never seen a pig in his whole life". That was probably true! We laughed and we cheered on the brown pig. He came third! Then they raced miniature goats, ducks (of all things) and teeny little pigs. For the last race, they wanted women to represent because they were going to crown the queen of the pigs! Leo was sitting on my lap was trying to get me to raise my hand. I didn't want to be selected because winner had to kiss a pig. He stilled tried to push my hand up! The pig races were really fun and probably best part of the Fair.

We also played the squirt gun game. Mommy won! And Aidan and I rode on the Ferris Wheel. We were all going to go on together but Leo was not going to have any part of it. I thought that was funny because Leo is usually the one that wants to go on the rides. He had already been in the moon bounce and on a train ride but the Ferris Wheel he would have no part of. Aidan totally stepped up to the plate and rode on the Ferris Wheel with his mom and he had a great time. He wasn't afraid at all. We looked at the huge park from way up high, spotted a monster truck, tried to find our car in the parking lot, and we looked at all the rides to see if me or Pa and Auntie Heather had ever gone on them.

It was a hot, hot day but we had a lot of fun! Afterwards, Leo took a nap, Aidan and I planted a few end of season flowers to spice up our yard and we washed the car and played in the sprinkler. We were exhausted but we had a great, great time.

I had a lot of work to do today. I lost a little sleep over the weekend thinking about how I would get the work done on Monday. I decided to go in at 8am, cancelled a 10am meeting and planned to work on something that was well over due from 8am to 10am. At 11:18am I finally finished the document I was working on and I went to the bathroom. When I got back to my desk I had some crazy error on my computer screen and all of a sudden it said "Windows is shutting down". I didn't save my work (I don't need a lesson on saving) and I started to freak out! Doris the kind friend that she is came over to console me, called our computer center, and they were able to find the recovered version of the document. I thought about what I would do if I couldn't get the document back: go home, go crazy in my cubicle. I seriously wasn't sure what might happen. It's probably not appropriate but I wanted to kiss the computer guy. I was SO relieved. I felt like I couldn't do anything else for the rest of the day.

Good night.