FAIR WEATHER FRIENDS

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY THE SOMERS RECORD (09-18-25)

     We've never been to the great New York State Fair, and this year we decided to go and check it out. If you're headed upstate, you should always plan your trip for when you're in the market for a used car. If you look on the lawn in front of most houses, just to the left of the driveway, there is a used car for sale. If there is no "For Sale" sign on it it means that whomever drove it last missed the driveway by a good margin just before the car heaved its last breath, but you might as well make an offer anyway if you're feeling lucky. Some of the more "classic" vehicles are of a vintage just before the car radio was invented, but if you know Morse code you can communicate by telegraph.

    There is also a lot of farm equipment available up there, new and used. I would love to get my hands on a tractor. WHY? My wife asks. Have you ever tried tracting by hand? Takes all day. A backhoe would be nice. My wife put her foot down on that one, but she never said no to a fronthoe, and I can just turn it backwards.

    Anyway, the Fair is a fun and kitschy slice of Americana. Later that evening at the bar I used the word "kitschy" twice, and was informed that to say it more than once is insulting. A good example of kitsch is the annual butter sculpture in the Dairy Building. This year's rendering depicted the theme of, "Dairy: Good for You, Good For the Planet." The work of art used enough butter for over 76,000 pancakes, and over 1400 full-time cardiologists.

    Our first stop was the Canine Stars Stunt Dog show, where dare-devildogs performed high jumps of up to 48 inches from a running start. All of the participants were rescue dogs, saved from a life of inert loafing, and forced to jump four feet in the air all day long to earn tiny morsels of food. One dog refused to take part in this charade, and vaulted over the fence to lick random members of the audience instead, and was universally hailed a hero.

    Other stars of this dog day afternoon could jump 26 feet into a pool of water. By contrast, I brought my dog Gidget into the pool one time to teach it how to swim, which instead turned into a lesson on how to defend yourself against a dog who, while remaining extremely cute, was apparently well versed in mixed martial arts and perfectly content not knowing how to swim.

    The Hawk Creek Birds of Prey exhibit is absolutely raptorous for any bird lover. A fun thing to do is to take someone whose company you really can't stand and, without their realizing it, position them in between the two people with the falcon glove on. When they let the hawk go it flies about two inches over their head to the other falconer, causing your friend's pacemaker to fibrillate to the approximate tempo of "Cry of the Brave" by DragonForce. If that doesn't work you're stuck with them the rest of the day, though.

     It's a great way to learn about these amazing creatures. For instance, the great horned owl, besides being totally cool, has no sense of smell. The reason this comes in handy is because it has no qualms about preying on skunks, and, I'm hoping, people who eat garlic for breakfast and then ride on the same train as me. The peregrine falcon can fly at speeds up to 240 miles per hour toward its prey, possibly a turtle moving at say, three inches per hour. When the turtle catches up, 45 days later, he is immediately eaten, but not before he has a good laugh over the whole thing.

    We attended a show starring John Stetson, The Mentalist. If I had known about mentalism when I was in college, perhaps I would have majored in it. My Dad would have been all for it, since he usually referred to me with similar-sounding adjectives. Anyway, John Stetson picks members of the audience whom he thinks are on the same intellectual wavelength as he is, and guesses what numbers they are thinking of, and so forth. There is always a deck of cards involved. I was thinking the show might be more interesting if there was money on it, and he managed to guess what your hole card was. But he never guesses anything particularly relevant like that, but he does emphasize the power of positivity. If I was a mentalist, I would pick out, maybe, the CFO of Nvidia, and mentalize whether they were planning a stock split or something, just in time for the closing bell.

     The Ferris wheel is a great place to end your day, see the entire playground from the air, and find where the nearest zeppole concession is. There was only one true Ferris wheel in history, designed by George Washington Gale Ferris Jr. and built for an 1893 expo in Chicago. It rose 250 feet into the air and was later sold for scrap before its inventor died three years later at the age of 37. The one we rode at the Fair was small in comparison, and we ended up right back where we started, proving that what goes around, comes around.