The Puyallup Fair

We decided to take Charlie to the huge local fair, the Puyallup (that's pronounced pyu-wal-lup for you Californians) Fair that is going on this week. Although it was strongly hyped to us by our new friends, we did not have high hopes. After all, we are cynics from the city, and the fair slogan was "Happy is good," the kind of lowest common denominator advertising that we love to scoff at and mock. However, immediately upon our arrival, we looked at each other and said, "Now this is a real fair." We were surrounded by energetic spa salesman, young 4H club members jauntily toting hay bales and dumpsters marked "Poo-Poo Only," fire-juggling unicycle-riding comedians, fiercely competitive pygmy goat shows, really terrible and earsplitting yodeling demonstrators, booths offering anything from the ever-popular "Miracle Car Chamois" to homegrown honey, and a sea of vendors all claiming to provide the "original" and "authentic" and "historical" fair cheeseburger. Incidentally, we did not have any forewarning from any of these "fair" hypers that any food item you may purchase at the fair that has the word "fair" in front of it on the menu is, in fact, smothered in grilled onions. For example, the "fair cheeseburger" was indescibably delicious, the "fair chili-cheese fries" were a risk but also highly palatable, but I was considerably apprehensive when it came time to order a famous "fair scone." I love scones, in all of their humble glory, and I also have a growing affinity for grilled onions. But never the twain shall meet, in my opinion. Happily, the only thing my scone was smothered in was some sort of berry jam, and my full pregnant tummy was spared what could have been a disastrous event. We took Charlie to see all of the different kinds of animals, and she was delighted to see in person what she usually reads about in books: tiny chicks cheeping in the warmer, fluffy white rabbits stretched out in relaxation in their cages, giant cows and horses contentedly munching in their stalls, and goats bleating and butting heads in their pens. Although, with the chickens, she couldn't decide whether they were hens or roosters, and as they didn't make any of the sounds they should have, she decided they were all hens. Poor rooster, all he had to do was crow to keep himself from being emasculated, but he didn't know. We also got a special treat at the fair--we got to see Billy and the Hillbillies perform, and two of them were Billies we recognized from the Disneyland Billy Hill and the Hillbillies. They even sang some of the same songs and told a few of the same jokes we knew from Disneyland, which was so fun for us but also a little homesickness-inducing. Altogether, as Jeff Foxworthy would say, "We had a good day at the fair... let's go buy us a spa!"